The Prepping Thread - A Newer Beginning ;)

Karmacat

Congratulations, thriftygifty, how lovely to have your new baby boy home already.

MrsCD

Congratulations to Mr & Mrs Thriftygifty! Welcome to the world little one.

C_J

gran3 said:
If neighbours chose to expose themselves to infection, well that's their problem, as long as we stay clear of them.

But it’s not just their problem, that’s the thing. They pick up the virus, and are infectious before showing any symptoms.  They might then unwittingly pass it on to others, and before you know it, it has killed your 90 year old Father. Or they become so ill that they require an intensive care bed, and they expose a health care worker to yet another viral load. 

Apologies for the rant, but people’s inability to see the consequences of their actions makes me so angry. Now is the time for responsible behaviour, not selfish stupidity.

Greenglockenspiel

Congratulations thriftygifty!

[Deleted User]

Morning preppers, I spent a lot of yesterday sorting out the store room, moving all my prepping equipment into the emptied under stairs cupboard, moving my stores from the big cupboard in the room on to the shelving unit that previously held the equipment! phew! have some nice achey bits this morning to show for it and can see gaps in the stocks where I've dipped into them over the winter.  I shall order in a few extra tins with every food slot we're able to get and make up the deficiencies over the next few months, gone are the days of being able to buy trays of 12 from Lidl.  The big cupboard currently contains 2 jars of spicy pear jam, it will be added to as I make jams, preserves, dehydrated goods over the summer and autumn period to avoid wasting anything we buy or grow as well as using that to feed us too.  Not knowing how long this pandemic will last and therefore may effectively leave us in isolation means plans are difficult to make accurately but I'm going to jam, pickle, dry, freeze and preserve by any means I can find as much as it's possible to make and if the current impossibly hard situation carries on for the perceivable future we'll have variety in the meals I can make and if it eases and we're safely able to go out and about again we'll have lots of nice things to enjoy with cheese or cold meat in the winter next year.  Either way it will focus me now, necessary in these uncertain times!

jamanda

This prepping lark is OK, but I'm running out of house.

mothernerd

I also love life in lockdown mostly. I am aware that I need to get out more because I may get to the stage when I don't want to go outside even when it's possible. I think a lot of people are 'following the rules' but with no understanding of what is happening or any cmprehension of the seriousness of the situation. I went out yesterday, just as far as the nearest postbox and although it was mostly quiet, as I neared the postbox I heard voices behind me. 'They' were gaining on me so I sidestepped into the road - it was two men walking and one on a bicycle, carrying on a converstion, went around me (reasonable distance only because I'd moved off the pavement) with nary a glance. They were all my age or older - they had grey/white hair and looked a bit weatherbeaten, whether from manual labour or sitting in the sun drinking I don't know.

Noticed the local corner shop was open again too, sells food but as many are these days, its main trade is booze. The post box used to be on their wall but is now on a post alongside their property but before you get to the shop premises. Wasn't out long because it was a high pollen day and with successive days of no rain to damp it down I'm struggling. Taking one a day tabs so my eyes and nose aren't constantly streaming but still have a sore throat from pollen grains lodged there, permanent low grade headache. My honey arrived but I couldn't open the jar (used my magic jar opener couldn't grip the jar with my other hand) so will wait until I feel stronger or ask DS2 to do it when he next visit's (I have a special visitor's chair which I put outside the front window when he is on his way, then open the top window so we can hear and the blinds so we can see him. I bring the chair back in (with gloves on) after he's gone and it sits in solitude just inside the gate (it's different to the normal garden chairs so I never use it by mistake).

Read a snippet about the Spanish flu, deaths from the second wave vastly outnumbering  the first. I think the majority of the population, well first of all they don't think much (especially those that read the daily wail aka 'The Paper That Supported Hitler') but I think (it sounds so presumptuous knowing what the majority of the population are thinking) they assume that this is it, after this few weeks everything will go back to normal. They haven't thought through that this administration is perfectly capable of 'letting them out' again until the number of casualties push the NHS to breaking point, then another lockdown for everyone (assuming sensible people like ourselves will continue in lockdown until it's genuinely 'safe') until the death toll starts to recede again whilst continuing to push ahead with Brexit b*ll*cks (against the advice of business and financial expertise as it will deliver a massive second blow to the economy still reeling from the virus), with no trade agreements in place, talking the the tango king who advises people to inject themselves with household cleaners (and then says he was 'being sarcastic' when deaths from ingesting household cleaners doubles) and floating plans to seize personal savings (Financial Times article - only second hand report).

But as long as their own personal finances are okay (Rees-Mogg's firm making massive profits) and hand over wads of tax (Our money) to their financial supporters and tax dodging scum like Richard Branson. Sorry I'll stop and return to prepping matters.

You asked what preps you would do differently/ more of. For me it's 'what things I would have brought from home' if I could have. I told mum I was moving in with her on Monday 16th March and that after Friday no-one but us was allowed in. On the last day (Friday - I was sleeping here from Wednesday) I went back home (town centre) did some packing (by this stage I was shoving anything 'useful' into a bag or box and piling it by the front door) came back to mum's (the taxi driver was one of our regulars and had a huge car) to accept delivery of my polytunnel. Mother of twins called with the twins (she had brought wraps mum had asked for) and she gave me a lift back to town. I opted to be dropped at little Arseda (5 minutes from home but I have been using the spare walker to carry heavy bags of shopping. Had to leave that behind as car seats for the older two girls had to be put in the boot to fit me in). This was only the second SM I went in that week, both were mid-afternoon vists and i presumed the ravening hordes had gone first thing. Similar pattern of bare shelves and other areas untouched. Picked up quite a few bits and was struggling to get across the car park when I spied a 'broken' trolley (have learnt from experience that the broken ones don't set off the the alarms at the carpark threshold). it wasn't a problem when it was still Netto - just tols the person on checkout that I was borrowing a trolley and took it back afterwards (very useful for monthly tins and dry goods shopping and mahoosive bags of kitty litter when the boys had a cat each). It wasn't broken but belonged to a different SM, so put my bags in and walked home.

When I made the final trip on Friday evening, I had to leave about 5 bags of stuff behind so asked DS3 to put them on the trolley (meant to go back the next day and it's also easier to pick things up from a table/ bin or other mid-height surface than the floor) and it's taken 4 weeks to get them here.

So I wish I'd brought my sunhat (DS2 bought me one this week but he ignored my instruction to go to the reduced section and look for a 'decorating for Easter' one, so it cost £8), wish I could have brought nearly everything in my yard (old type bins, large containers for growing, fold out growing bags (1m x 0.5m x 0.5 m) made of strong thick recycled fabric, the cabbage and leek seedlings that were ready to be potted on, the compost (next door cleared their shed out and dismantled it, thought it would be a fun wheeze to dump their compost in my green bin, took me all day to heave it out again, why couldn't they just ask, I'd have taken it). I could have used more of nearly all the tins (especially as I'm letting mum have nearly all the fresh fruit and ask for more every time someone offers to pick things up for us) but that was just down to shopping dates. Swings and roundabouts as I had to make an extra trip to Icyland when something essential didn't arrive and picked up a lot of bits that disappeared fromt the shelves a week later. Similarly I had 3 bags of plain flour and some yeast because one of my monthly aims for February was to try bread making again. We aren't doing badly for food (our first actual SM delivery is due on the 28th, ordered 3 weeks ago after doing the wait up until midnight and I've done another for 9th May although I do wish mum would stop telling everyone we have loads of food and complaining about 'too many oats'.

I wish I'd got more cs books. As the boys grew space for my things reduced, I used to have a dream where I ended up in the corner of the kitchen, in my chair with my books and other possessions lined up on the tiny (originally would have been the pantry) windowsill. I bought my tiny terraced house intending to live there alone. The small back room was intended to be a library/ study/ sewing room. When I first moved in the back bedroom was mine, the front bedroom was my livng room. The house had been empty and boarded up for 11 years, someone had broken in and taken up the stone flag floor. My brother got them back down but the front room was uneven so I only used it on very cold days. Dad had cadged the bar shutters from a club that was being refurbished. The shutters were strips of wood held together witth linked brass hinges with tiny screws. On cold days I would feed broken up bits of the shutter wood into the fire basket in the hole where the fireplace would once have been, drinking cup-a-soup to keep warm and if I had the money a hot meal from the chip shop. I only had a kettle and a battered enamel sink that the builders had used for mixing cement in (I chipped it all off, scrubbed it clean and had it re-installed).

Well I have what I have and will make up the rest. Years of living in abject poverty (managing to be happy despite it) have given me many skills and I'm rediscovering a few. I am well down for my lengthy posts but this is a bit excessive. I don't feel like a proper prepper, just some one who visits now and then and sits on a spare stool by the edges of the people around the campfire, so I don't like to take up too much of your valuable time. I have completed an elephant of a letter and must return to sorting the garden (mum insisted I put the polytunnel over the strawberry bed, but I knew I would have to get them out of there sometime, started cutting 2l plastic bottles up for a bottle garden last night) and doing the cleaning (usual cleaner can't come in so covering for her....and the district nurse.....and the window cleaner) and do some baking (to use up surplus milk and eggs as elephant letter has taken >5 days). Just brought veg from the veg box from the shed and fed the wild birds.

nannywindow

Hello all, I read along but rarely post.

ThriftyGifty congrats on the safe birth of your new little man.

We did prep more than normal as DH thought this was coming here and we upped our food stores a lot, but I am still learning new things. This old dog is never too old to learn and I hope you don't mind me stealing some ideas. I have even planted some sprouting potatoes from a bought sack. I think this virus will be around longer than some people seem to think, so we are getting used to the idea of semi-isolation long term, no more going into town to shop.

nan

Si_Clist

MrsLurcherwalker said:

 ... Not knowing how long this pandemic will last and therefore may effectively leave us in isolation means plans are difficult to make accurately ...

Quite.  But we're firm believers in planning for the worst whilst hoping for the best, so our policy now re stockpiling stuff from the shops is to buy whatever seems sensible if it's something we're certain we'll want to keep eating/using for the forseeable, and we can be sure of using it up before it goes too far out of date.

Having kept accurate records for quite a while, we know how much of most things we use per month.  Let's say we use 4 packs of Thing per month, and the furthest-ahead BBE on the packs of Thing we have in stock today is next April.  Theoretically, our ideal stock level of packs of Thing is therefore 48, assuming all the BBEs are no sooner than next April.  

In practice we haven't got room for 48 packs of Thing, but doing this exercise for the faster-movers in our stash has at least given us a better idea of what sort of quantities to aim for.

boultdj

I wish I'd got more yeast in, and plain flour, but it's the room it takes up, there is only so much space, still all 3 of my flour bins are fullish, so can carry on baking for  bit, likewise for adding to the tin stores each time I can get a slot.
Planted some more cucumber seeds today, hope they grow, radishes are popping up, courgettes are looking well, 7 of the 12 plant's have survived, so plan is courgette with everything, good job I've got a dehydrator as they will be going into a soup mix pot.