Well, we knew it had been far to long since we last updated our 72 hour kits. After all our 6 year old daughters backpack had infant formula in it!
And never mind the twins they had no kits at all. Almost all of our emergency contact information was obsolete and most of the clothes, food and first aid supplies were expired. If there was a fire I would have been better of grabbing one of the dirty laundry baskets. At least we would be likely to have some extra clothes
The wonderful Easthope Family once told us how they would open their 72 hour kits during General Conference (the part watched at home, obviously not in the middle of the chapel) and eat everything that was not going to last for another 6 months. After updating the kits for the coming season and changing needs they would put the kits back away for the next conference and do it all over again.
We thought it was a really good idea. Doing it during conference makes it easy to remember. Here we have Anna with what we guesstimate will keep us (and dog) live and well if we would have to rely on it for 3 days for food. We would be very dehydrated but water is heavy. What I would really like is to get one of those hiking water purifying bottle things, then we would not have to carry nearly as much with us.
Our first aid supplies was in a massive disarray and we spend quite a bit of time organizing them before we put together a small kit for each backpack.
We talked over the likely and not so likely scenarios for us having to evacuate in our corner of the world and find most likely that we would not be wandering the wilderness having to snare wild rabbits and hunt for mushrooms in order to survive. It is much more likely that we would end up in a temporary shelter that consequently would be short on food, water, medicine, toilet paper and would spend allot of time staring into space so we packed a very small toy in each of the kids packs, -and a roll of TP! (that stands for toilet paper, you are welcome all non American readers).
We have entertained the thought of doing a dry run of the wilderness version with our kids. Just grab the kids get in the car with our sleeping bags and our 72 hour kits and drive until we "run out of gas" at a prearranged "wild" location where we will then test drive our kits so we know how to better pack them should, heaven forbid, it ever be the real thing.
If you do not want to be bothered with making your own kit you can always just order one and be done with it. Here are some helpful links.
A few recommendations in case you are new at this. Pack everything in separate waterproof reusable packaging, like Ziploc bags. You really do not want to worry about lifting your bag out of the water when crossing a flooded street or if you are stuck outside in the rain and your "dry" clothes are just as wet as the rest of you.
Don't pack your favorite clothes. Chances are you will never ever need them and if you do, you are a refugee, a dirty stinky refugee in your torn up favorite clothes. eh?
And what if you had to use someone elses phone with out all your preprogrammed numbers in it. Would you even know how to call your mommy? hmm? Type a detailed list and do not forget to put it in that Ziploc bad with your other important papers. If you come back home to find all your stuff destroyed by a flood/fire/tornado/vandals would it not be nice to know that you still have all your vital records and the really important stuff like who holds your mortgage?
We printed each of our contact lists with a family picture on it so that in case we somehow got separated it would be easier for rescuers to see who the different members of the family belonged with. What if something happened and you were unconscious or hurt and could not explain that there was still another kid that needed rescuing?
Food for thought people, food for thought.
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