Get ready for winter / zombie apocalypse etc - the GET PREPPED THREAD!

[FunnyRunner]

Just a place to share some general ideas and tips for getting ready for a severe winter. Fingers crossed this will be a mild one but we've had a few bad ones recently so looking for ideas.

What do people think are the basic essentials to have in the house?

Online lists seem to suggest the absolute basics are:

• Food
• Bottled water
• Wind up torch and radio OR battery op plus lots of batteries
• Adequate medication for the family plus first aid kit
• Baby milk / food and pet food (if needed)
• Shovel and grit / salt for clearing paths
• Plenty of fuel and / or blankets

What foods will you be keeping in your emergency box? Ideally I want stuff that can lie down in the basement for a couple of years in a box.

If you have found any good gadgets please share links :)

Right my top up list is

soup
pasta
pasta sauces
some packet pasta things that you just add water to and are very light to carry.
noodles
tinned veg
tinned fruit
rice pudding
tinned steamed pudding things
UHT milk
evaporated milk
peanut butter
flour
sugar
juice
chocolate
fruit cake
dried fruit
lemsip
paracetamol
dioralyte stuff (ours was dated 2009 )
honey (apparently this is better than storing sugar since it lasts forever and is less likely to get insect infestation)
cat food

all of this is stuff that we can use anyway

My stock cupboard will look better by the end of the day!

littleredsquirrel just looked in mine, items on my to get list
are:

tinned fried onions aka lazy onions (backup for if dont have any fresh)
Jars of salmon/chicken paste
tinned pate
tinned princes deli fillers
crackers
crumble mix
meringues
dream topping
capri sun drinks
lucozade type drink
tinned sliced mushrooms
tinned carrots
tinned chopped tomatoes
tinned beans and sausages
tulip tinned turkey breast
ovaeasy powdered egg

oragel (for toothache - numbs it in no time)
anaesthetic throat spray strawberry flavour
calpol fastmelts
heartburn tabs
soothers lozenges
blister plasters

Keep the lists coming people they are giving me ideas!

I mentioned in a previous post that I was awaiting delivery of an omnia oven. Its used mostly by the sailing community. My order was processed really quickly and I received the oven within a week. Today I used it for the first time and thought I'd share the results with you. I used the recipe on page 49 of this cookery book www.omniasweden.com/fileadmin/omnia_files/Cookery_book_080131.pdf The recipe said to cook on a low heat and it was spot on. I had read on a ladies blog that regularly uses the oven on her boat to bake the bread on a higher heat but I think it must depend on the type of stove you are using. I cooked my bread for 20 mins at about 10 0' clock on my gas camping stove. I found that the bread was a bit burnt on the bottom and so in future I would turn it down to a very low heat and bake it for the 30 mins indicated in the recipe. Like all other homemade breads it was heavier than shop bought bread and there was a slight smell/taste of yeast. Sliced it would give you a piece of bread similar to a slice of garlic baguette so not huge but I decided that I would cut the bread into sections which would give you enough for a decent size sandwich for about 5 people. I've added photos to my profile showing the oven and the bread that I made in it. Not sure how you take a look being a newbie but your all welcome to. Glad I bought the Omnia oven, its been 0 degrees outside since yesterday teatime up here in Cumbria only just starting to warm up so if there was a snowmageddon event and we lost power I would be happy knowing I could cook/bake indoors with it. (with adequate ventilation of course)

Probably going a bit over the top now but survival guide for beginners is free on kindle at the moment.

...be on the safe side and see if you can coerce a team of zombie squashing soldiers to come and move in with you - that way you know you will be safe - no matter what happens ! Although you may have to design a bigger pantry !!!

and possibly think about contraception too ?! lol !! - did I just type that ! bad woman !!!!

I of course have my own zombie to protect me Oneplan!

Thoughts of contraception first thing on a Monday morning - what sort of site do you think this is!

Hello0! I'm really marking my place because I want to finish reading and have to go out - have only read the first page :)

I wanted to ask about wind up mobile phone chargers for emergencies - I live in rural southern Germany (not far from the alps) - it gets down to minus 20 for weeks on end here most winters, and we usually have snow on the ground without a break for months BUT the infrastructure is good and things don't grind to a halt, roads are cleared efficiently etc.

My concern is the car, as due to rural location we have to drive a lot, and I am often alone with the kids on long journeys on little used roads - I broke down the winter before last on the way home from dropping my older kids at Kindergarten, it was below minus 20 at about 8am, and I had my youngest with me, who was just a baby - I'd just bundled him into his snowsuit over PJs, thinking I was only going out for 20 mins and would be in warm car and warm Kindergarten for all but a few seconds, but the car became jerky, I thought I could get home, then it literally stopped running in the middle of the road and wouldn't move, so I had to get him out and stand by the side, and he wasn't warm enough and howled and howled :( Luckily we were only a couple of miles from home and another mum I knew stopped and gave us a lift home - it turned out the diesel had frozen in pipes which run "too close" to the outside of the car (Fiats are NOT designed for such cold weather - should have got a German or Scandinavian car!) .

Even though I am aware of the diesel issue now and buy the diesel treated to be guaranteed not to freeze below minus 25, I remain paranoid about breaking down in winter - the kids are all still little, and I already have emergency blankets and spare food and water, and fleece blankets in the car, as well as a diesel can, an extra bottle of screen wash, a small amount of emergency cash (enough for some fuel or a small meal for us if stuck at services - hidden behind a panel), first aid kit is a legal requirement anyway, but I have extra plasters and wound spray, and of course a torch and spare clothes in case anyone got wet on a freezing day (some of that is in the car anyway all year and gets used, esp the clothes)... and I put a kid's size snow shovel in the boot yesterday :)

What else would you put in a car to prepare for winter? :)

We live out in the sticks a bit and the year before last when we had bad snow my friend was stranded for most of the night in her car (a mini!) not far away. It worried me a bit and so I now have a winter kit for the car which takes up most of the space in the boot but at least I'm prepared.

water
drinks and snacks (if I know the weathers going to be bad I take a flask)
sweets (because they last for ages and you can put them in and forget about them until you need them)
torch
spare boots for all
hat scarf gloves for all plus if I know its going to snow I sometimes throw in our skiing trousers and extra socks.
a sleeping bag and four blankets plus emergency foil blankets.
emergency warning triangle (to put on the roof)
bright orange sainsburys carrier bags to put out of the windows (so that people can see us)
cat litter and salt to sprinkle on ice
piece of carpet or cardboard to put under tyres
small collapsable snow shovel
deicer
window scraper
five nightlight candles and a box of matches (one of which will apparently heat the car enough to keep the temperature comfortable)
tow rope
jump leads
bright yellow safety jacket
hand heaters.
cards and books to distract the DCs

Always also have the phone and ipad charger cable so that I can let someone know where we are.

Mr tumblesbavarianfanbase

I would suggest keeping sleeping bags in the car if you have the space. you can add a fleece liner to a thinner sleeping bag to make it warmer. You may want to consider adding one of these www.amazon.co.uk/HeatStore-Emergency-Zone-Weather-Survival/dp/B007QCFUZ0/ref=sr_1_13?s=sports&ie=UTF8&qid=1384277046&sr=1-13&keywords=Emergency+Zone to keep the children from being so exposed to the elements and some hand warmers. Another issue could be the need to go to the toilet when your caught in a remote area so a folding toilet of some sort along with some of these www.amazon.co.uk/TravelJohn-Disposable-Solid-Waste-Bags/dp/B000NV9YS0/ref=sr_1_2?s=sports&ie=UTF8&qid=1384277343&sr=1-2&keywords=toilet+bags they have some for liquid waste too.

May i direct you here briefly!

SNOW!!!!!!!!!!

Oh thank you Lisaloo and Littleredsquirel

Is that really true about tea lights? That's definitely an easy one to put in the car! :)

My husband revealed tonight that he thinks I am a nut case with the fleece blankets and foil emergency blankets in the car, so I need to tread a fine line between being prepared and being ridiculous, at least when we have no snow forecast/ on the ground yet!

Sounds as if the UK is getting snow before us this year - we already had quite a lot this time last year! Though it melted again by Christmas - the worst of the snow and ice and shovelling the car out of the drive each and every morning in temperatures that stay below minus 10 for weeks and weeks, here have been January and February, at least for the 6 years we've lived here.

my husband thinks I'm bonkers too.

Not for the car, but...

There's discussion of the fact you can't / shouldn't keep plastic bottles of water for a long time because of chemicals in the plastic leaching out - but what about glass bottles of water?

Where we live lots of drinks (including water in about 37 grades of fizzy to still :D ) are sold by the crate in recyclable glass bottles, which you pay a refundable deposit on.

Would a crate of still water in glass bottles stored in a basement still go "off" - given water and glass are both inert (I think ))

Im obviously getting a bit obsessed but I read that water doesn't go off. With the plastic bottles the issue is the fact that the plastic degrades and this can affect the water. With glass that problem isn't there. Water only tastes stale when it isn't oxygenated enough and so apparently if you shake it before drinking it it will be fine.

I am reading way too much prepping stuff!!

Me again :o

I am going to try and do my 'emergency shop' list tonight and buy supplies tomorrow.

I ordered quite a lot of stuff on Amazon but have never been so unlucky with orders - one that vanished without trace, the other defective and needed replaced. Certain irony that all my non-emergency items have arrived fine and the get prep ones are the ones that have been crap

Watching with interest!

Have been testing out some of my goodies - winds are terrible here and our power does get hit sometimes. I am happy to say our wind up lantern, wind up torch and wind up radio / torch are all working well :) Need to wash out the water storage containers and get them filled up too.

Still haven't managed to do the emergency food shop yet Must sit down and make a list.

Well, we got a big wood delivery this morning. That'll keep us warm for a while :)

Is it cold with you funnyrunner? We were freezing here yesterday but today is much milder.

We bought some new logsplitters at the weekend which will hopefully make woodsplitting an easier task. The DSs are very excited because there's a junior one too which was designed for use by scouts etc. Free labour!

Hi Squirrel, very cold here but not snowing cold, just a very bitter wind chill which isn't unusual here. I have put the heating on more yesterday than I usually do in about 3 days and I've had it on for 2 hours this morning too (my hands were too cold to type ) Wood splitters and child labour = an excellent plan! :o

Why can't I get my act together with the emergency shop? I keep putting off making my list.

My top up shop wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. I wandered around not really able to decide what to buy. My cupboards are looking better but still not great.

Still no emergency shop I am an emergency housekeeping failure!

Maybe we can eat the wood?