The First 72 Are On You.

Say what?

The concept is pretty simple and everyone from FEMA, Red Cross,  to your local city recommends that you have enough emergency supplies to last you for 72 hours.  That's 3 days folks.

Why am I talking about this here?  Well, first of all, it's my blog and I can discuss whatever I want.  But most importantly, I feel that the job of a Wife and Mother is to care for her family in every situation.  Every single one.  And that includes emergencies.

Do you have enough food on hand to feed everyone?  What about water?  Would you be able to find your flashlights if the power went out?  How would you cook a meal if you didn't have electricity?

My goal here is not to alarm you or lead you to think I'm some sort of crazy conspiracy theorist.  Trust me...I'm not.  What I'm trying to have you do is simply prepare your family for an emergency.

First- think about where you live.  Is your region prone to earthquakes?  What about a flood?  Research what has happened in the past in your area and how long it took to get things back up and running.  Then plan for that.  Simple as that!

For example, I live in the Seattle area.  We have snow, ice storms, lots of rain and sometimes heavy wind.  OH- and we are due for a major earthquake.  Several years ago when my son was 18 months old, we lost power for almost 2 weeks in the home we were renting at the time.  This was in part to a wicked series of wind and snow storms.  I thought we would be fine because the house had a wood burning fireplace.  What I did not know at the time was that the fireplace was inoperable- completely.  We went without heat in the middle of winter, no showers and hot water and all our food spoiled.  I resorted to heating our home with candles and at night we all huddled in the master bedroom in order to be warm enough to sleep.  And by all, I mean- husband, kid, dog and rabbit.  Yes, even our rabbit.

By the end of those 2 miserable weeks, I learned a very valuable lesson.

1. It could have been worse.
2. I didn't ever want to be unprepared again.

In the last few years, I have slowly taken steps to ensure that my family won't be caught in the storm again.  Literally.  I began working on our 72 hour emergency kit.  I grabbed an old duffle bag and put in a good first aid kit, some food that only needed water to be cooked, flashlights, candles, extra dog food- basically anything I thought we would need in the first few days after a major storm or event.  In the last couple of years, I have started increasing that 72 hour kit.  I now have enough emergency supplies on hand to last 8 days.  My goal is 14.

I am also careful to make sure that I have a well stocked home.  What exactly does this mean?  Well, I always have lots of canned items in my pantry.  Extra freezer meals, a large first aid kit, extra toilet paper, firewood, charcoal grill and plenty of charcoal.  Think about it- what good would all that food be if you had no way to cook it?

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I have also made sure that I have enough water for my family and our 2 dogs for at least 3 days.  The rule here is to have 1 gallon per person per day.  Surely you can find room in your home to store 3 gallons of water per person for an emergency?  We all know that we can go a week without food, but water- now that's a true necessity.  So if you do NOTHING else- please do this!

My hope is that you'll take 15 minutes and simply stop and think about what you need to provide for your family in an emergency.  Really think about....if you have canned foods, do you have a manual can opener?  How would you cook those foods?  Do you have enough water?  What if there was NO running water or the water was contaminated?  How about heat?  Do you have extra blankets?  Candles?  Matches and lighters?

Another important factor to remember- don't assume you'll be able to buy what you need after the storm.  If the power is out and a store's backup generator is also out, that means your credit and debits cards won't work.  If there's trees down or power lines down and they are blocking your road- how are you going to drive to the store?  And do you really want to wait in hour long backups to buy gasoline or bottled water?

A little prep time now will save you down the road.  And it will definitely add to your sense of security.  I hope you'll think about it!


***Want to read more?

Have you got the first 72 hours covered?

Well check out my follow up post that tells you what you will need for the next 2 weeks.  It's an Emergency!