How to Prep for the Unexpected - An Overview and a Plan

Prepper - Someone who focuses on preparedness, generally for various worst-case scenarios like peak oil or armageddon. Sometimes used to avoid the more loaded term survivalist. Some preppers focus on guns, others on sustainable agriculture.

Honestly, I am not sure whether or not we might be considered Preppers.  We have emergency food and a few supplies put away, but we don't rotate or inventory them as often as maybe we should.  We have a general plan of what we might do if something happened while we were home vs. while we were at work or on the road, but we don't practice it.  We grow a lot of our own food, save our seeds, keep laying hens and bees, cull our chickens and preserve the harvest bounty through canning and dehydrating, but we don't do this with the end of the world weighing heavy on our hearts.  We do it all because we like it. If it gives us some skills in the process, sweet!

I do believe that the shit could very well hit the fan.  Whether it be fires, crazy weather or a nuclear meltdown, foreign or domestic attacks, or some illness/plague of some kind (or some other not-yet-imagined scenario), something could easily happen to alter the day to day comfort of the lives we all lead.  I don't, however, choose to focus on this possibility all the time.
However, when I watch a movie like World War Z, like I did a few weeks ago, my brain begins to spin. Why?  Because I believe that, if the shit did hit the fan, we would most likely be in our cars on our way to our day, already at work or on some errand of some kind.  We would be oblivious (for the most part) to what was building around us because I do think our government wouldn't want to scare the masses. I don't believe we would have a heads up or be given an action plan. The individual person can be incredibly smart...however, groups of people tend to behave like those around them and usually that behavior is negative.  Sheeping.  Group-think.  Whatever you want to call it, it is pervasive and the governments knows it.

So, if I'm on my way to my day and the SHTF, what should I have on my person that might help me through whatever it is that is happening? What should I have in my Every Day Carry (EDC)?  What is ideal to have in my Every Day Carry Bag?  What about our 72 hour Kit and our Get Home Bag?

There are a lot of ideas floating around there in Internet Land for all of these categories (and so many more) and I've been pinning some of them to my Preparedness/Survival board for a while now.  A lot of the ideas are specific to where you live (California, Florida, the mid-west) or what you fear (earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, government takeover), but I'm more of the middle of the road kind of lady.  I want to be prepared, but I'm not going to twist myself into a knot over it.

For the purpose of this series, I will be looking at the recommended preparedness tools/kits and, with help from Tool Lady, will be evaluating what we have already pulled together in comparison to what is recommended/looked at as "best practices".  My hope is that, through this exercise, not only will we become more prepared for any unexpected occurrences, but that I will also be able to inspire you to look at your own emergency supplies and plans.  Not everything I do will work for everyone else, but inspiration and ideas are free and important.  Especially when prepping for Zombies ;-)

So, over the next couple of months, I will be slowly evaluating everything we've already done, making plans to improve on our basics and sharing it all with you here.  First up will be my Every Day Carry (EDC).  Stay tuned!

xoxo,
Melissa

Linking up to The Homestead Barn Hop #123,
Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways #85,
The HomeAcre Hop #32, From the Farm 

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