Our Family Meetings - Change

I would suggest you form your own family organization for this. We don't talk alot about it in our ward or stake and it is something that needs to be discussed on a regular basis because there is so much to learn and do - one lady after seeing a presentation I did said, "This is really a science isn't it?" She said in a nutshell what I have felt. I will be forever grateful for that comment.

Our monthly phone meetings about preparedness are working to keep this in everyone's thoughts, but we have discovered because we are in 5 locations it is a bit of a struggle to talk about 4 topics each time. (Original Post about our Famly Meetings ) We are changing this to one topic in depth each meeting.

Each person is a chairman of an area. That person will make assignments within their area to the rest of us. We have also felt that we need to focus on skills for a while, we will cover the food in detail later. Everyone is currently gathering and so it isn't as much of a rush to learn more about that.

This Month
June 6th Call 6:30 p.m. MST
Subject - Water
Water Chairman - Dad

Mesha/Jeff - Sterilizing water from river, rain, etc
And/Brent - Water needs 72 hour kit, car kit, first aid kit, household & how much clorox, boiling, etc to purify
Jonathan - What can be used in addition to water to drink and ideas to extend cleaning with water
Kalea/Ben - How much water is needed for daily tasks for adults, children, babies.
Shay/Casey - Storing Water, container ideas, saving containers for each other - do we need to do that to help out?

Doing a 90 Day Meal Plan - BREAKFAST

It has been suggested that we get not only long term storage, but a three month supply as well. this is what is said in the Family Home Storage Pamphlet - a full copy is at http://www.providentliving.org/ .

THREE-MONTH SUPPLY
Build a small supply of food that is part of your normal, daily diet. One way to do this is to purchase a few extra items each week to build a one-week supply of food. Then you can gradually increase your supply until it is sufficient for three months. These items
should be rotated regularly to avoid spoilage.

In our family meeting in March this was one of the items discussed. I was in charge of this part so I made up 90 days of menu ideas. In this post I am sharing my breakfast menu ideas.

I made up a list of 7 menu's and I figured out how much would be needed per meal then times that out by 12. These menu's aren't set in stone, but they do give me the needed supplies to make a wide variety of breakfast menu's as long as I have the basic supplies.

Right now this is for 3 people who are here at the house living. Obviously it would need to be adjusted if more or less are living here!

Oatmeal or Hot Cereal/Toast/Fruit/Milk (2 times per week)
3 boxes of oatmeal, one box powdered milk or evaporated milk, 1 carton honey, dried fruit, bread supplies***
Pancakes/Tang Drink or Juice/Fruit (2 times per week)
2 boxes complete mix, 2 bottles syrup, 1 container tang, 12 pints canned peaches
Cold Cereal/Toast/Yogurt/Tang
6 boxes cold cereal, 1 package rennet, 1 box powdered milk, canned or dried fruit for yogurt, 1 pkg tang
Breakfast or Coffee Cake/Hot Chocolate/Fruit
12 packages muffins to make into cake or br. cake supplies, 12 dried or 12 pints canned fruit, 6 packages hot chocolate
Muffins/Canned Ham or Bacon/Hasbrowns/ Hot Chocolate
12 pkg ready to mix muffins, 12 cans meat, 1 pacakge dried hashbrowns, 6 packages hot chocolate, use meat fat to cook hashbrowns

TOTAL:
24 pkg muffin mix
12 cans meat
24 pints canned fruit or dried fruit equivalent
12 pkg hot chocolate
2 pkg Tang
2 pancake mix boxes
2 bottles syrup
6 boxes cereal
3 boxes oatmeal (or instant equivalent)
1 box powdered milk
1 pkg rennett
1 carton honey
1 gallon package dried hashbrowns
Bread making supplies includes for 2 loaves of bread a week for breakfast meal (Other meal amounts with that respecitve meal - not every breakfast meal has bread)
8 cups flour per week = 32 cups = 16 lbs.
1/2 cup pwdered milk reconstituted into 2 cups = 2 cups powdered (add to milk above)
1/4 cup oil x 4 = 1 cup
1 tbsp salt x 4 = 4 Tbs
3 Tbsp sugar x 4 = 12 = 1 cup
1 tbs yeast x4 = 4 tbsp

I Am So Excited!

I have been working in my garden all summer and we have been blessed with an abundant harvest. I have canned 150 points of green beans, 280 pints of corn, 18 quarts of pickles, and 24 pints of V-8 juice. I still have more cucumbers to do, another bushel of tomatoes, more corn and lots of squash. We are canning cherry juice, apricot juice, plums and apples from our trees and peaches from Utah. Our storage room is looking filled up! WOO HOO!!!

Here are a few of the recipes:

Frozen Corn- This is from our youngest daughters mother in law - Elaine

Ingredients:
$ 6 c. corn sliced from cob
$ ½ c. water
$ 2 tbsp sugar
$ ½ tsp. canning salt - Plain salt
$ ½ cube butter
Bring to boil 2 - 3 minutes
Put in pan to cool. Put desired amounts into zip lock bags. Freeze.

Yummy Dill Pickles - Betty my darling friend

6 heads dill
6buds garlic
6 small red dried peppers
6 thick onion slices
1 qt. vinegar
2 quates water
1 cup uniodized salt
small cucumbers
1. wash cuc's
2. pack in quart jars
3. add 1 each of dill, garlic, pepper, and onion
4. combine vinegar,water, salt - boil
5. pour in jars
6. seal as regular pickles

FOR QUARTS WATER BATH 20 MINUTES

Apple Pie Filling - Also from Elaine
Ingredients:
$ 6 quarts apples peeled and sliced
$ 4 ½ c. sugar
$ 1 c. corn starch
$ 4 tsp. cinnamon
$ 1 tsp. nutmeg
$ 10 c. water - Cook above ingredients til thick
$ 3 tbsp. lemon jr
$ 1 tsp. salt - Add to the sauce

You can make sauce ahead of time. Fill jars with sliced apples the cover with sauce. Cold pack in canner for 20 minutes. Use one quart of apple pie filling per pie

FRIDAY - Learn Something New Day

I found a most interesting site about water purification.
Check it out, I am going to research it further.
http://www.sodis.ch/