Weekly Assignment, Food Storage and Emergency Preparedness (Week of August 4th)

Hi Carson Ward Family, Family and Friends,

How prepared is your children's local school in case of a disaster?

With school starting soon we need to make sure our children and grandchildren are protected in case of a disaster or emergency situation. How prepared is your child's school for an emergency disaster? Do they have an emergency preparedness plan?

While our daughter was living in Torrance, California, USA I was very impressed with their school emergency preparedness plan. Each class room has a large trash can with wheels where at the beginning of each school year the parents are responsible for putting together a 72 Hour Emergency Preparedness Individual Kit for their child. If they had a previous kit from the year before they replace the food/water and clothing (children grow). In the child's kit they have food and water for 3 days (3 meals, juice drinks, water and snacks), a warm sweater, a photo of their family, and an activity book with a pen or pencil (and sharpener). Everything is placed in an extra large plastic zip lock bag with their name on it and place in the large trash can which is kept in each classroom. If there is an emergency and they need to evacuate the teacher can roll the classroom emergency trash can with them. At the end of the school year the parents collect their child's kit and return it the next year with the replaced items. I love this idea!!!


Some schools have large metal containers they store emergency food, water and medical supplies in for the school. This container brings me some concerns. I do not think the food and water is replaced every year, you might want to check on this with your school, and being in a metal container with the hot sun beating on it everyday will cause the food to not last as long. But, it is better than nothing!


Check with your children and grandchildren's local school and school district to see what precautions they are taking to protect your children in a disaster or emergency situation.

Great New Find...

There is a great website where those with special needs during a disaster or emergency situation can register and receive the help they will need. Go to SNAP and read all about it and register. "Should a disaster strike in your area, this registry will be used to enhance the efficiency of those agencies called upon to respond." (snap.lacounty.org) This is for people who live in the Los Angeles County, USA. There may be volunteer groups in your county or area that may do the same thing. Check with your local county or area.

Weekly Assignment: 72 Hour Individual Emergency 
Stressor Kit

What is a Stressor Kit? A Stressor Kit is a kit that will help you and your family members during a disaster or stressful situation. If provides things to do. There are 10 items in this kit. We will add one or two items each week.
 
This week add the following: 

 

1) A family photo to each family member's Stressor Kit

 














2) An activity book (age appropriate) to each family member's Stressor Kit
 

Blessings of a Vegetable Garden...

I have talked about this before. Let me share one of the blessings we have received this year from our vegetable garden. As you remember from my last blog posting, while our grandchildren were here visiting from Missouri they helped me harvest and clean our carrots. There were large bowls of carrot everywhere in our kitchen. I blanched and froze 86 cups of carrots. Our freezer is full of carrots, zucchini and tomatoes. I figured out how much we have saved by growing and harvesting our own carrots. Yes, it is a little bit of work, but I love the results and it is worth it. I can purchase a package of frozen carrots at our local grocery store, about a cup and half, $1.00 for each package. That is a little over $57 dollars. I purchased two packages of organic carrot seeds for about $5. I saved $52 by growing my own carrots. I can also purchase a pound of fresh carrots (2 cups) for $1.00, still saving $38.00. Wow! I love it! Not only have we saved money, but we have carrots in our food storage.

Emergency Preparedness Ideas: 

Emergency Preparedness: It's Not All About Food...

Click here for great ideas from Meridian Magazine (LDS magazine) on non food storage ideas to store and why. Three pages of great ideas. Print this one out. Share with family, friends and neighbors.


Comments: All your comments, ideas, suggestions and experiences are welcome! We all learn from each other. Thank you for your comments.