Friday, March 19, 2010

Be Prepared

For the past couple of months, I have been feeling the strongest impressions to get my family ready for a natural disaster.

As it is now, I have not been very good about putting together any sort of 72 hour or flight kit. I have a couple of items in ONE backpack……….but with 6 family members, one backpack with a few items is not going to go too far.

As parents, we are responsible for the care and safety of our children. I think I am doing a pretty good job on the day to day basis, but if there were a natural disaster in our area, my kids would suffer.

So because I want that peace and comfort that comes from being prepared, I am determined to get 72 hour kits for EACH member of my family.
I want to be self reliant and more confident if something should happen in our area.

But as I get my family prepared, I feel the need to tell everyone how VERY important it is to get your family ready for any kind of disaster. A little bit of money and time now, may save your life later.

I find it amazing that along with these promptings to get my family ready, the Lord has blessed us with the money to do so. We have randomly received extra money from work, family and of course tax returns.

This extra money could very well go toward something trivial that we have wanted to get, or we can get our family prepared. We have decided to forgo our wants and make sure our family is safe.

I have calculated everything I will need for my family, by going to the king of all websites Emergency Essentials (click on the name to go to the site)

When you think of putting together a 72 hour kit, it can get a bit overwhelming.
So to make things more simple, I found a 72 hour kit that I liked on this site, looked at the contents in the kit and wrote down all of the items I liked.

After that, I searched for each item and got 6 of them. (Some items you will only need 1 of each………such as a tri-fold shovel or radio)

I like this website because a lot of their items are created to pack into a small backpack. Also, most of the blankets are reflective and can keep you warmer than just packing a normal blanket you may have laying around your house.

I will also be including a deck of cards and a little beanie baby in each of my kid’s packs. That way, if we have to be away from home for a while, they will have something to play with and give them a little bit of comfort.

You may want to add some snacks that you know your kids like. You will have to rotate through them on a regular basis, but at least you will have something for them to snack on…………JUST in case they don’t care for the MRE packs.

I am also going to include some medicine in our packs. After we got hit with sickness this past couple of weeks, I realized how much I need to beef up my medicine supply for disaster purposes.

I hope this information will help you get started. Like I said, it can be overwhelming, but once you sit down to do it, you will be amazed at just how simple it really is.
And the peace of mind it will provide for you is priceless!!

2 comments:

Jess said...

About two weeks after moving to TX, we got word that a hurricane was coming our way. I rushed to get 72 hour kits ready. We didn't need them for that year (just a tropical storm), but we did have a hurricane a year later. I can personally testify the necessity of being prepared. You especially need to be ready with those food items, because your grocery stores will not open without electricity. Also keep plenty of water on hand!

Rebecca Hansen said...

oh my goodness i really need to get on the ball. between food storage and 72 hour kits, i really need to get organized. it's so nice having websites that map it out for you.