Preparedness for when

GreyQueen

Aww, I'm feeling all warm on the inside (and suffering stove envy yet again).

When you click on post, you get a window with the various smillies on the right of the bit you type in. If you click on them, they'll appear in the text wherever you left the cursor.

At the bottom of the window you'll see COLOR=RoyalBlue]More[/COLOR and if you click on that you open up an expanded window of more smillies, inc the Dodgy Group Hug :grouphug:, the poorly one _pale_ and various seasonal options.:snow_laug HTH.

dannie

Hollyberry - Check Tesco for your lactose-free milk. I think they are currently 3 for £3.

Hollyberry

dannie wrote: »

Hollyberry - Check Tesco for your lactose-free milk. I think they are currently 3 for £3.

:T Brilliant! There's a big Mr T up the road - will go a-hunting...

Hollyberry

westcoastscot wrote: »

edited to add: meant to say I agree with Nuatha - boots and gaitors for grip and waterproofness - wellies are rubbish these days grip-wise. Nuatha hope you and your missus are well - first married christmas eh? any special plans??

I'm definitely with you on the walking boots in bad snow. Bought mine in Chicago about ten years ago when my arrival coincided with more than 12 inches of snow, and staying upright was a challenge. They were really cheap, and have lasted me well, so the cost per wear must be down to pennies or cents now. Never felt brave enough to try for gaiters (I think I still have my schoolgirl hockey player calves ), but I seem to manage to keep dry enough above the boots in most depths of snow.

On the subject of neighbours, I don't think I'll be reliant on my new ones in any crisis. My study is on the first floor, and my introduction to them was making eye contact with the gentleman of the house as he prepared to prune his trees. Whilst sitting, perched atop a pink velvet cushion, some ten feet in the air on top of the stump of the neighbouring tree which he had just finished pruning. I checked, but didn't see any film crew for the Darwin Awards hovering nearby. The trees are recovering. The neighbour hasn't actually moved in yet. :rotfl:

JayneC

Evening,

Welcome Polly, it's nice here we're the sane ones really, its everyone else who's crazy, Honest!

The talk about perennials reminded me of these people http://www.agroforestry.co.uk/
There's lots of info about perennial crops and you can purchase plants and seeds. There's also lots of videos on you tube, search Martin Crawford and/or Forest gardens.

Wyre I see others have beaten me to it, but I would definitely recommend walking boots over wellies. Went walking about in the snow in wellies (carol singing wouldya believe it!) once and my feet were like little blocks of ice since then it's walking boots all the way. Found a pair of walking boots in a skip the other week! Furry lined and all, nothing wrong with em apart from a couple of spots of paint, so they were promptly rescued:D

GQ I smiled at the thought of you being circled by a helicopter - I'm afraid I would probably have waved.

Talking about grocery spends - mine is £180 per 4 weeks including household stuff and food prepping, for me, 2 teenage boys, dog and 2 chickens, plus Saturday afternoon visitors for tea which can be 10 people and is at least 6. I usually do a monthly shop of non perishables spending up to £80 and then £25 per week for fresh stuff, oh but then there's another £20 a month for the milk bill (I get a pint a day delivered). I could do less and have done £25 per week for me and DS for a while, but not much stock building with that.

Went on our hunting trip last night, but didn't manage to shoot anything. We did see a few shooting stars though, as we were right out of the town and so no light pollution. The sky looked amazing, it's no wonder ancient people were so fascinated, it makes you feel very small indeed.

nuatha

westcoastscot wrote: »

edited to add: meant to say I agree with Nuatha - boots and gaitors for grip and waterproofness - wellies are rubbish these days grip-wise. Nuatha hope you and your missus are well - first married christmas eh? any special plans??

Thank you for your good wishes.
Unfortunately we're still being dogged with health problems (actually still waiting for a diagnosis for Herself).
We're planning a fairly quiet Christmas at home - this might be our second in 13 years, usually at least one of us is at work.

westcoastscot wrote: »

Pineapple we're £400/month for three adults, and that's cooking practically everything from scratch as we have food allergies. We don't have access to any of the large supermarkets, except a tiny tesco and the petrol station. We have a medium sized co-op, but we're limited to what we can purchase there as even the salad's have gone over to pre-packaging and its too risky for us. We rely on local shops, with a "big" shop every 6 - 8 weeks in the city and what we can grow. We don't have home delivery, although it is coming, as the next village has it from tesco.
The nearest tesco, aldi and lidl are a 70 mile round trip - takes about 1.25 hours either way on roads that are challenging, or if we want bigger supermarkets its a 160 mile around trip to Glasgow - 2.5 hours each way.

It has loads of other advantages living here though!

WCS

I know shipping charges get rather silly North of Glasgow, but is serious bulk buying an option - when I was dealing with a number of food allergies and preferences, I found the easiest and cheapest way was to bulk order from one of large wholefood suppliers. We ended up with several families sharing orders and shipping costs.

Hollyberry gaiters shouldn't be a problem, they weren't with my 14 inch calves from playing rugby and martial arts.
Decent walking boots are a sound investment, I generally expected seven or eight years of serious use from a pair (it would be longer but a fair chunk of my walking was in peat hag which isn't kind to leather or stitching)

Perplexed_Pineapple

Had a few days off t'interweb and taken best part of a week to catch up :rotfl:
Welcome newbies :wave:
Nuatha it had never occurred to me to measure my calves before, nearly 17"
Have been watching American Blackout on utube while doing the ironing, only about half way through, definitely going to be taking the stairs from now on. Still very much an amateur prepper here but think the wind-up lantern, solar powered radio and various camping type stoves with modest reserves of fuel would keep us ahead of 99% of the population. It's like being in a group being chased by a bear, you don't have to be faster than the bear, just faster than the slowest members of the group :rotfl:. Keeping an eye out for prepperish things in the seasonal sales, haven't found much yet but have a small list of things to get if the price is right. GQ I'm in awe of your economical grocery bill, with a family we have economies of scale but growing kids are a bottomless pit so far as food is concerned, it's our biggest expense.

nuatha

Perplexed_Pineapple wrote: »

Had a few days off t'interweb and taken best part of a week to catch up :rotfl:
Welcome newbies :wave:
Nuatha it had never occurred to me to measure my calves before, nearly 17"

I had a few years where I was very aware of my measurements, 36 inch thighs and a 32 inch waist made shopping for trousers interesting. The thighs are smaller these days, unfortunately the waist is a fair bit larger.

siegemode

[QUOTE=
I do have a question for folks - where would one buy wellington boots that are actually suitable for walking up a hill in the snow? Does anyone have any reccomendations on makes etc? We live on a very steep hill, and not even the road is gritted let alone the path (although we do our bit for the neighbours and across the street). This year I would like to be able to leave the house without worrying that I am going to end up at the bottom of the hill in the busy main road! Thanks in advance![/QUOTE]

How about these ? I finally got me a pair last year after constant recommendations from a close friend and after searching for comfy and practical boots that fit and feel good.
I live in fear of slipping in bad conditions and the oc system on the bottom that flips over to reveal the metal grips is so neat. They really are the most comfortable and toasty warm boots ever. Not cheap but a great investment. Took a couple of years of persuading before I'd part with £80 for a pair, but so glad I did. I seem to live in them now.

Mammal Oribi Boot With OC System - Black

dannie

Hi Hollyberry,

Just checked it is the "Arla" range of milk both UHT and fresh until 10/12/13. Also have the cream, cheese types, spreadable and yoghurt on offer. Thought I'd mention this if winter stocks/xmas foods are required.