The Prepping Thread - A Newer Beginning ;)

boultdj

Sensible Lynn, I've added 2 extra tins to my next order to put away, a habit my Mum use to do when we lived in a small moorland village that could get snowed in for up to 7 weeks at a time, from June she use to buy one extra tin a week and put it on the shelves in the cupboard under the stairs for Christmas/ winter. It made sure we had stuff in to eat and did not break the bank. 
And think it is going to be a lot longer than any of us want. :-{

[Deleted User]

Yes. we looked ahead and got grow bags and compost and a load of logs before the official lock down started, a few weeks before in fact and I topped the food stocks too, looked at gaps and found them just before we heard of it.  Thanks Boult, we'll be in for the long haul too, I just didn't know if my imagination on a prepping level was taking me over the edge of what is reasonable, I'm not lone and that means heaps!

thriftwizard

I think we're in for the long haul, although it may be intermittent, i.e. another 3 weeks lockdown, a partial "release" for the healthy, another lockdown if the infection rate goes back up, etc. etc. Hence I'm going flat out at the allotment to get stuff off to a good start, and starting to build resilience into our home garden as well; there are potato sacks lurking in various corners, and there'll be leeks & kale strategically camouflaged amongst DD2's glorious dahlias & gladioli! We've always grown fruit & herbs here, (there are 5 lemons ripening on a potted tree in the garden as I type!) plus keeping a handful of hens & bantams, but it's too small for proper veg beds too.
Off now to pop some tiny seedlings out into the sunshine, though I MUST remember to take them in tonight - there's a possibility of frost tonight & tomorrow night, even down here in the Deep South!

herlig

I think the most prudent amongst us, specifically if there are health concerns, will be looking ahead to months, not weeks, of this and I lean towards double figures in terms of months issues will last. The social distance measures being relaxed will only effect those who are confident in their ability to fight off any residual virus. Those people will try to live life like they had it in January but many of society will be in relative lockdown of their own making and choosing due to fear.

My own personal take on it is that what we're experiencing now will be here until at least next year. Add to that the pressures of an incoming autumn and winter, further Brexit developments, a climate that produces either deluge or Beast from the East in the winter months on top of a very downtrodden society that is nursing all sorts of worries and woes.

I'm preparing for the autumn into winter as best I can, in a time when it's very difficult to prepare and when I'm in the middle of using preparedness items I have already gathered. I consider myself to be prudent while others will probably call me a catastrophic personality. 

[Deleted User]

I'd call you a sensible mortal with feet on the ground and a head in touch with reality!

Thriftygifty

I happy with our level of food prep right now and deliveries set up however not happy with the way we are using it, I need to be alot more cost effective with a) what I am buying and b) the way we are using it, I will be spending any free time researching recipes and putting together a collection. DH tried to finish the greenhouse base today and the cement mixer is broken 😭 so close yet so far. I've started to think towards Autumn and Winter, whilst DH is home we will be venturing into the loft once Ive had this baby, I plan on digging out my neglected sewing machine and making draught excluders for all the doors with the fabric sat up there doing nothing, I also want to sort out the toys that I bought from carboot sales which will now be the childrens christmas presents and sort the camping gear out etc. 

[Deleted User]

Thriftygifty have you heard of 'window quilts' an American invention that you put inside the curtains not quite against the windowpanes held in place on  a wooden baton to be an insulating layer and keep heat inside rather than losing it through the glass.  Might help, look online to see how to make them, all the rage a few years ago and very effective.

Foodwise I try to make things do more than one meal, I like dishes that happily overlap like Bolognese sauce that next day with a tin of beans becomes a shepherds pie and if there's any of that left then with a bit of corned beef or cheese and a handful or so of flour mixed into it you can make potato cakes for the third day.  I also like dishes that start as a hot meal like Marguerite Pattens Victory Cook Book raised pork pie (made with sausage meat) which is super hot with mash and salad or veg on the first day and then is really nice cold with a jacket and salad or chips and beans for a few days after.  Saves cooking fuel too which is another area to look at. 

boultdj

Looks like I've got to get another solar charger for the phone, OH has found out it is also a torch, and nabbed it.
OH has cleaned out some large pots for me with the jet wash, so some of the cucumber plants can go in them tomorrow, and the tomatoes are getting ready to pot on.

mothernerd

I think the news that 91 people in South Korea who had had the virus and recovered are now testing positive for it again means we are in for the long haul. Started looking at link-a-bord website but need to know how to break it to mum.

I am mum's carer. 'Normally' I come around lunchtime 3 days a week and stay until anywhere between 7 p m and 9 pm. Recently mum was seeing the district nurse twice a week and there were a lot of early starts so I got into the habit of coming the night before (I have a CPAP machine so staying overnight tends to be a 3 bag job) and when the continuing cough/ cold/ sore throat bugs (usual winter stuff - I've had it on and off since December, mostly annoying but from time to time it floors me) were bad I came for a week but stayed in 'my' room most of the time - just was struggling with the stairs at home so much.

I took 4 days to transport as much of my bedroom (clothes, meds, toiletries, all paperwork, sewing and craft stuff) and part of the kitchen (anything DS3 and his gf would not eat (dried and tinned pulses, frozen fish) plus any cooking ingredients mum would not have (she's a 'jar of sauce' person), and as many charity shop books as I could gather. I've now been here 3 and a half weeks. I ordered a polytunnel, some compost and a few veg plants (mum has a reasonable space - 8 yards x 10 yards - but has had it reduced to tree stumps and beds covered in gravel since she moved here four years ago. I have been sneaking things in without her noticing (much).

She made me erect the polytunnel (3m x 2m) over the strawberry bed so I need to relocate those as I need more space. I have some large bags made of recycled material that fold out to 1m x 0.5m x 0.5m. I packed the empty ones plus some of the potato bags in double bagged binbags but they were one of the things I had to leave behind (thought the taxi driver was going to start crying on my last trip here). DS2 brought one of them - because of how I had packed them he could hold them up to the top of the fence, cut the outer bin bag and the inner bin bag and the bags themselves slid contactlessly behing mum's tiny shed and I left them there for at least two weeks (don't really need them yet but trying to set things up as I go along). He hasn't brought the other thing as DS3 was coughing and my things had been left in the house with him.

I have ordered a mini greenhouse and several plant pots in two sizes (only a few left in stock, seed trays and lots of other things unavailable) and have saved any tins/ bottles/ yoghurt pots that could be used for growing things/ mini cloches/ self-watering.

Mum is in a very high risk group (the pills she need to stay alive have killed her immune system and mine is compromised) so we were both in for the full 12 weeks but I can see that being extended. I have set up milk and eggs delivery and a veg box, we had our first meat delivery last week (including, cooked meat, cheeses and a locally made plate steak pie). Mum only has 3.5 drawers of freezer space so have been using things to make space and will take out one or two things at a time to make into meals. I have my first SM delivery coming on the 28th (we were regular customers as i find putting things in and out of a trolley difficult - arthritis in right shoulder) and plan to keep meat and SM delivery at about one every 3 or 4 weeks. DS2 and a member of the extended family have done mini shops but both had cough 'scares' in between offering and getting stuff so it was a bit hit and miss.

Definitely think it's time to start to maximise growing space and start adding a few tins onto the orders. We have plenty now but at the start of winter I order 10 each of all mum's favourite soups and similar amounts of tinned beans, tuna, tomatoes, pasta and any sauces/ non-perishables. (Everybody scoffed, they aren't laughing now).

My main worry is income. I get £66 something a week carer's allowance, extremely small earnings from self-employment (4 years to retirement due to all the goalpost moving) and was getting some Working Tax Credit. They recently decided that I was not entitled to WTC and should pay them back everything they have paid me over the past two years. I have used their calculator and I should be entitled to £150-91 every 4 weeks, so I have been overpaid but only roughly £570 each year for the past two years, not the over £5,000 they are asking for and my claim should continue. £37 a week may not sound like much but it's the difference between scraping along and having a little extra to give me some choices (and save for the desperately needed house repairs and replacement kitchen - have to put plates away one at a time as anything above shoulder height is increasingly difficult/ painful).

I don't qualify for any of the government 'help' - along with many other small business owners. I could make a claim for Universal Credit but this would preclude a successful outcome for my WTC appeal (and they would automatically reclaim what they say I owe from any money awarded). It is also complicated by the fact that my 'home address' is not my 'current address' - I suspect this would send their computer into fits (anything non-standard does) and their default reaction is to reject a claim and let the claimant/ customer/ service user (not sure what we are called nowadays - probably scrounger) challenge it. I'm not in any danger of starving as I'm with mum and she is currently paying for food but it's rather an ambiguous position to be in. I can continue to work (therefore am entitled to WTC) in lockdown but I can't deliver stuff (very delicate embroidery, not to be entrusted to post even if I had any way of getting to the P.O.) or finding new customers - so no business income and probably no busines either.

I am keeping cheerful (I have long-term fairly severe depression but manage to be happy each day) but it's hard when I've struggled so long just to keep going and I'm simply written off as being 'economically inactive'. They can't send me out to pick vegetables as I go dizzy when I bend down. So yes, I'm doing what planning ahead I can without getting into a spiral of worry and despair, whilst waiting for the next curved ball to hit.

needmoney

@mothernerd I hope all goes well for you, take care.