Welcome tiggeratplay! I still share our excitement after many years of prepping 🙂 Welcome to the boards!

Welcome tiggeratplay from Southern Ontario. Glad to have you on board.

Welcome.
As you suspected all along your grandparents aren't paranoid or weird, matter of fact they had it right all along. Learn as much as you can from them and please do share it with us.

Good evening friends,

Just wanted to thank everyone for the very warm welcome.There was a comment about my grandparents,and yes they taught me well.Just gonna put one thing out there as its one of my many seasonal projects that I do every year.I keep an ice house both winter and summer.I can remember as a young child in at my grampas home place being sent to the ice house in the middle of august to get a meat product out to thaw for that nights meal.In my ice house right now I still have blocks of ice that I put in there last march.All we do for this is go and cut blocks of ice in the winter,stack them in there and on each level I put about 6 inches of sawdust.I kid you not I dont own a deep freeze,thats how I keep all my frozen product year round the old fashion way Sawdust and blocks of ice.Most of the stuff I do come fromjust normal ways of of living.You now the way people survived backed then,right from smoking my meat both domestic beef and pork,to wild game.Another thing I can remember them doing back then was taking a wooden barrel and in the summer time they would take it and bury it at the edge of a bog or in the peat moss,then salted the meat and such,they even used to salt apples and pears .Now I now in this day and age alot of people wpould say how un-healthy all that salt is,well I can pronounce salt...just sayin.and we are talking about survival.Anyhow I hope everyone has a great week.feel free to contact me .

Kindest Regards

Michael

Nice to 'meet' you, Michael. I too am new here, but, not new to 'preparedness'. Not fond of the word 'prepper' (though I use it for 'simplicity') nor the term 'survivalist' (which is often misunderstood as being a gun-happy prepper). Truly prepared people ... just live a 'prepared' type of lifestyle and have a conscious, thoughtful approach to making sure that, no matter what happens, they have anticipated what would be required to take care of themselves and loved ones - as you do, as I try to do. That said, I am probably somewhere in between a 'prepper' and what the world would call a 'survivalist'. My penchant for 'preparing' just comes from common sense, having grown up in a less techy era with a mother who was always picking wild berries and putting them up, not to mention engaging in pastimes like spinning, dyeing and weaving/knitting, and a father who 'crafted' just about anything that was needed around the house, including parts of the house itself. I spent many years in the Yukon as well, where one learned to be appreciative of 'basics'.

I am currently located in the US but, in a few months time, will be moving back (finally and thankfully) to Canada ... to a new place in Nova Scotia, on the northeastern shore. I think/hope this new community, a very small one, may house many like-minded - read, sane, pragmatic, resourceful - individuals who have traditionally just always been 'prepared' and 'skilled' as part of their lifestyles but also have never called themselves 'preppers' and/or have never even heard of the term. I will keep my hunting and fishing equipment when I move up there - especially since the Canadian government has made it easier now for me to bring my 22 etc. - never know when you will see an extra meal nearby. I hope I never have to employ my hunting equipment for anything except that activity where I am going to live.

I would love an ice house in my back yard. I am jealous! I could still probably build the structure if I had to, but I doubt I am able these days to cut and haul the ice. So, I will use the indoor freezer for the time being, and continue to dehydrate and can what I can.

I really can't believe this.I kinda of been preppin all my life,
In fact I never even new it was called prepping,just never heard that term.

Welcome Tigger! 🙂

I can so relate to what you said.
I was like: "Its called what?? Ya mean what and how I live, is called prepping... whoaa?" 😆
I was amazed as you, way back when I discovered it.
I was not 😳 but I thought, good... finally common sense was slowly seeping back in to a fair amount of people.
So very much good knowledge has been lost from parents, or grandparents that its sad.

Good for you that you still have your Grandma with all her wise knowledge yet.

Hehehe...don't worry about rambling. I am one myself and so far have not been told to quiet down..so far. 😉

Good afternoon all,

Hey TeslinNs,when ever you get back to Ns let me ,you guys come up with the icehouse
and it dosn't have to be much just secure enough to keep the little rodents out,and I'll
deliver your ice for ya free of charge,this is part of th reason I got on here,Again I use
this but being brought up by grandparents I was also taught that you help your neighbours
wether you now them or not,Thers things that I need to learn about and now that if I ask
I will be given the propper direction,and I just want to help out my fellow man,thats
have the problem in my opion no one wants to help the other guy,unles of course theres
something in it for them.I not a religous man by any stretch,but Nan always said that
the definition of "Spirituality was the giving of one self without expecting anything in return
and I try to do that in my life.////Just sayin
Have a great New Year All

Thanks, Tigger (I am a BIG A.A. Milne fan btw so I love your username). I will let you know if/when I manage to get an ice house structure built. 🙂 It might take a year or so - I have so many other things to take care of before I get to that (and hopefully to building a small smokehouse as well) - and I am an old lady (not senile or decrepit yet, but, old compared to you young whippersnappers! :)) so I move a bit more slowly than I used to. You are so kind to offer to deliver ice, especially gratis (though I would never let you go off unpaid in some respect - and I suspect it is some drive from where you are to where I will be). Perhaps it can be cut from the lake at the bottom of my own property, to which I supposedly have frontage rights. That is if the lake freezes - it is apparently shallow but the winters there seem to be warmer than many places even in NS from what I have heard.

On the other hand, you and your family/friends will be welcome to drop by any time - not to work, but, to eat (I love to cook - you would be doing me a favour just by coming for a meal or three!), to stay and/or to learn anything I can teach you (though I don't imagine there is much since you are lucky enough to still have your grandmother alive - and I am sure she could teach me much more than I can teach her or you). I hope to be in my new home by summer - so if you are into 'Stanfest'ing let me know - you won't have to camp (unless you want to)!

I love your (and your Nan's) life philosophy .. it is mine also ... and that is a major reason I am moving to Nova Scotia. It is great peace of mind to know that neighbours will help neighbours, just because that is the way it should be, and has always been done. Where I live now, though I know many are self-sufficient in these hills, there are too many who are not and would seek to take advantage of the good nature (and prep assets) of others - and violently so, unfortunately - rather than just helping each other on a daily basis or in a crisis. One does not sleep well when one is in fear that, should tensions rise for any reason - natural or man-made - violence probably will ensue. OPSEC - operational security - i.e. not telling anyone anything in case they come back to steal from you, or worse - is critical down here. One does not feel one would be among friends if worse comes to worst. I am so tired of that way of living. The US is so polarized these days that it is hard to feel comfortable here any more, especially since losing my husband this year. 🙁 Though I am not naive - there are less than 'hospitable' people in Canada too - I feel much relief and much safer every time I cross back into Canada, and I particularly felt that sense of community in small town NS.

Happy New Year to everyone too! I am finally looking forward to this new adventure and to a great year to come.