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Chevy55

Excellent post Buggie....

I'll put out a different approach to getting prepared.
That list alone looks overwhelming to me. Build your capabilities slowly without breaking the bank and spend a lot more time thinking what will work best for you, even better if you can make things do double duty like solar garden lights that can come indoors. I can't see any reason to bug out of my house beyond a fire(in my area anyway). A credit card and document package are enough to cover that. Again, what works best for you.
Fix yourself up so you can last a day or two without power or water, then work towards a week, then longer.

From what I've seen almost everyone puts far too much emphasis on gadgets and far out what-if's than they do on feeding themselves every day.

We started by deep stocking our pantry with what we usually eat, getting to the point where we don't need to shop for a few weeks at least. Our goal for stuff that stores well is 3 months. All the dry goods, paper products, soaps and such we try to have at least 3 months worth.
Have plenty bleach, vinegar and baking soda on hand and that covers most all cleaning.
The stuff that goes bad fast you have to go powdered - eggs, milk, creamer. Some flour (learn to make bread by hand and quick breads) and a breadmaker(fast, easy).
Fats are something you need to stay on top of, not many keep well. Clarified butter (ghee) and coconut oil store well.

Extended that out farther with FD food but not entrees,we have a few #10's of stuff like chicken a la king(a few handfuls of veggies mixed in and you have a meal). #10 cans of FD veggies mostly and canned meats like ham, chicken, corned beef, fish. Still need to get some FD meats for long term.
Dried beans, peas, rice, pasta you can do yourself from the store(freeze for a week before packing). You can go mylar or just save good glass jars and use an O2 absorber and keep in the dark.
50 lbs each wheatberries and rye (broken into 5 lb mylar bags and stored in 5 gal buckets) and a grain mill.
We should get some corn as well. I like cornbread.

Looking at the above I'm fortunate in that I learned to cook and have little need of pre-packaged meals. The basics are pretty cheap compared to having someone put it together for you. Bouillon and sauce packets liven things up.

For water - the water at our BOL is great so I bought four 5 gal soda kegs to make transport and dispensing easy. When empty I fill with tap water and seal so the chlorine disinfects them.
100 gal in rain barrels. Berkey filter system for long term.

We've never had power at the cottage so living without electricity has never been a stretch for us.
Outside our house we have solar spotlights (6) and higher end garden lights(3 LED) that can be moved indoors in a pinch for lighting. Multi purpose lights in selected receptacles - nightlight, emergency flashlight, motion sensing light- Costco sourced.
1500w inverter hooked to the car in case I need to power something large. Generator but no real plans to use it here, it's mostly for heavy work at the BOL.
Wood stove ($200 used)ready to be hooked up to cook and heat a small area in basement, if the power goes out for a long time we'll move in to the basement that would be easy to keep comfy warm.
A few spare propane bottles for the BBQ. Plenty of LED flashlights that run on AA or AAA batteries (solar chargers do fine with these).

We only have a small freezer(by design I went dry storage as much as possible), that would be good for a few days and then there's not so much there that it would be hard to cook and eat up. Already tested this when I unplugged it by accident. (Had to cook 1/2 a pig mucho pronto and dried the beef - biltong. tomato sauce, veggie stew and cranberry juice and sauce used up the rest of the stuff there)

No mention of defense capabilities here but it doesn't have to cost a fortune to secure your home.
I'm a hunter of large and small game as well as fowl and sleep well with what is here.

The usual medical supplies that should be in everyone's house.

Full tank of fuel stored for the car(900km per tank). Could last 2 or 3 days any season with what is in the emergency car kit.
Trailer large enough to move most all of our supplies to the cottage. Cottage currently stocked with 2 weeks FD food, unlimited water. 3 months heat.

Those few simple things have us able to live for probably 6 months or more now and we didn't break the bank doing it. We probably spent an extra $200 or less a month over a couple of years for everything.
There were a few expensive things like generator (that does double duty though), grain mill, water filter but most of the rest was nickel and dime stuff, a little here, a little there over time.

That turned out a lot longer than I planned but I'm trying to impress on the new folks that it's not about having stuff, it's about doing what works for you.

perfersser: I agree with your post, and do think that it fits nicely with the overall message of my original post.

I simply proposed a method of figuring out what you need, and breaking it down into certain time periods. there is no use in my opinion planning to survive permanently if you dont even have the basics for 3 days nailed down. The intended audience for this post was new preppers who feel like they dont know where to start, etc. There are countless opinions flying around the internet about what you HAVE to have. while they may be good for some ideas and information, every person and families needs are different. By planning it out one stage at a time, you can focus on the things that you need in the short term, and gradually get yourself to a level that is satisfactory for you. start with 3 days... then a week... then a month... and so on. Assuming you plan on buggin in... although I would recommend having a Bugout plan BEFORE getting squared away at home for an urban prepper. I havnt found anything on the net to convince me that buggin in for a long period of time in a urban setting is a GOOD idea.

You're right there.
I suppose I should also have mentioned our long term plan is to move out of the city to our 12 acre plot we bought 5 years ago for that very purpose. That's the sustainable route to feeding yourself for the long term and changes the security, power and water equations as well but unlike many I do not believe there will be a societal collapse.

You're right there.
I suppose I should also have mentioned our long term plan is to move out of the city to our 12 acre plot we bought 5 years ago for that very purpose. That's the sustainable route to feeding yourself for the long term and changes the security, power and water equations as well but unlike many I do not believe there will be a societal collapse.

We've been debating to sell our house in the city and buying land cash - a safe distance away from the city 😉 We as well hope that you are correct about the societal collapse. However, it takes just one bad apple to trigger the domino effect, especially if people are hungry.

Certainly all the insights are very helpful, so please keep them coming.

We've just come through 2 power outages that have lasted at least 2 hours each and both have helped to validate and refocus our efforts. We have done well with some preps but we were lacking in others. Like all life experiences, we can ignore them or learn from them. In our case, we didn't like the idea of our kids going to bed with lit candles in their room - we found a great deal last week on LED flashlights (with radio no less) that can work on either traditional batteries or hand crank. Each kid now has one and during the second power outage, they went to bed with the lights cranked (no traditional battery by choice) and when they died out, it was no big deal for them to recrank them.

With food, we are taking a page from someone else we know - use our pantry as our own store, then replenish with each shopping trip, but double the quantities when things go on sale. We're trying to balance preps with spending habits.

That's just two of the things we're trying to do to build up our level of preparedness. Could we go a week with a SHTF scenario - not quite yet - but we're staying focus on expanding our ability to weather any storm (physical, economic, or other).

Buggie,
thanks for taking the time to share this excellent and positive post, lots of work there, I am sure it took quite a while to do this.

Shelter
- My House
QUESTIONS: How will we stay warm in the winter months? Where is our backup location?
STILL NEEDED: method to warm house in case of power failure

One of the most popular searches to my blog is on Rocket Mass Heaters and Rocket Stoves. (I give lots of info and links to Sources who have done them for over 10 yrs!)

I have seen one in person all done up in a house and can tell you, it works. Another great benefit is that it burns so cleanly that the only thing coming out of the exhaust was steam, no smoke, no smell, very little wood is used as the thermal bench keeps the heat in it for so long you need to use the stove part only in the mornings and evenings for a little while! so great for OPSEC

later this week I will be making a Pocket Rocket for my tent and a Rocket Stove for cooking, then maybe will start making a rocket mass heater for my camper, time and health are my only drawbacks right now.

You're right there.
I suppose I should also have mentioned our long term plan is to move out of the city to our 12 acre plot we bought 5 years ago for that very purpose. That's the sustainable route to feeding yourself for the long term and changes the security, power and water equations as well but unlike many I do not believe there will be a societal collapse.

We've been debating to sell our house in the city and buying land cash - a safe distance away from the city 😉 We as well hope that you are correct about the societal collapse. However, it takes just one bad apple to trigger the domino effect, especially if people are hungry.

I wouldn't do anything rash. We bought a house that was well within our means, worked hard at paying it off and getting (mostly) out of debt before looking for affordable property and even then searched for years before finding this place.
If you can do it and be in a cash advantage situation then maybe yes.
Don't do anything based on an emotional response, especially fear. Make a long term plan and work towards it with no hard time frame. This isn't a great time to gamble on anything so whatever your plan you should be in a better situation tomorrow than you are today.

The thing is that governments have become so powerful that they'll be able to react quickly with overwhelming force. Canadians are pretty well conditioned to be meek already and wait for the government to bail them out. Do you feel a undercurrent of unrest waiting to boil over now? Neither do I.
People talk about "without rule of law". I believe we'll see excessive rule of law after(if?) a very short period of unrest. Never let a crisis go to waste and all that.

Thanks Persfesser for the concern as well the insight. The best way to describe our prep is we are safely riding the fence or hedging the big picture. It won't matter which way it goes down, we will survive and thrive. We're aren't rushing into anything yet. To achieve a balance we've have bumped up some of preliminary basics. Security, Food, Shelter. Right now we're in the middle of decluttering and taking inventory. It's ironic and kind of funny how most of my hobbies throughout my life, circle around prepping. Like Hunting with rifle, bow and muzzeloading is my favorite, fishing, hiking/backpacking, organic gardening/canning. We are not conspiracy theorists per SE, If one can simply add and subtract it doesn't take a genius to figure out the US books are cooked and when you dig deeper one can see the fiscal decay continues globally - If it walks like a duck and talks like duck - there's a good chance it's a duck!!

If it walks like a duck and talks like duck - there's a good chance it's a duck!!

OH, JUST GREAT!! Now we got talking ducks. What next? 😆

Awesome list. Thanks.

If it walks like a duck and talks like duck - there's a good chance it's a duck!!

OH, JUST GREAT!! Now we got talking ducks. What next? 😆

Quack quack 😆

somebody mentioned this thread in another post, just thought I would bump it for any newcomers who have not yet seen it or had any input on it