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Guest Post by Jessica Smart
Nerdy confession…Emergencies sort of invigorate me. Tornado warnings are the most exciting. I jump into action, insulating the closets with pillows and craning my neck out the window to spot funnel clouds.
Nevertheless, it’s overwhelming to think about preparing my family for emergencies. I tend to struggle with anxiety anyway, so I sort of hyperventilate when I think about what we’d do for my asthmatic, food-allergic son without power or safe foods!
And there are so many questions:
- What kind of emergencies do I need to prepare for? Earthquake? Stock market crash? Apocalypse?
- What supplies and food do I need, and how much?
- How do I store it all?
- Can I stockpile on a budget?
I recently decided hyperventilating was not an appropriate form of preparation. I started researching and came up with my list of essential stockpile items.
- Bottled water and water purifying tablets
- Camping stove and appropriate fuel source (My rugged and manly husband has certified that this reasonably-priced one would be an acceptable choice.)
- Manual can opener
- Protein sources – dry/canned beans, canned tuna or chicken, nut butters, shelf-stable boxed or dried milk
- Carbohydrate sources – white rice (usually we do brown, but white lasts longer), pasta, oats, couscous (good option as it requires little water)
- Condiments: honey (never expires), salt, spices, cooking oils
- Canned/dried fruit and vegetables
- A light source: lantern (with proper fuel), headlamps, flashlights and batteries. (Candles also work, but if you have little kids, you may be happier with a less “interesting” light source.) Our N.J. friends lost power for eight days during Hurricane Sandy, and they said their lantern and headlamps were invaluable!
- Warm clothing: Under Armor or long underwear, wool socks, fleece pants, good gloves
- Medical supplies. Along with your first aid kit, don’t forget a first aid book, doctor’s contact info, multivitamins, old/extra pair of glasses for those use them, and prescription medicines. (I was able to get a few months stash of my son’s asthma medications with one co-pay when I explained to my doctor that I was stockpiling for an emergency. I think he thought I was a little crazy, but oh well.
) - Cleaning supplies: white vinegar, soft soap, hand sanitizer, alcohol, peroxide
- Toilet paper
Image by Tim Lehman
If you haven’t begun an emergency kit, it can feel overwhelming to begin. It helped me to list every single thing we needed, put them in order of importance, and try not to get discouraged while working slowly.
I started with a 72-hour stockpile. Instead of guessing at the food, I meal-planned like I do for the week. Then we’ll add to our pile. I’ve read that 2-3 weeks’ worth of water and food is a good goal. (Interesting fact: apparently you need a gallon of water per person, per day!) And if you have a pet, don’t forget water and food for him!
Here are a few of the basic emergency meals I compiled:
- Oatmeal: oats, coconut oil, dried fruit, brown sugar/honey
- Crackers & nut butter
- Chili (any combination of beans, rice, salsa, canned tomatoes and vegetable)
- Spaghetti with canned Sauce
- Chicken soup – broth, canned chicken, canned veggies, noodles
- S’mores – chocolate, marshmallows, graham crackers (nothing like a special snack to boost the morale!)
I’m on a budget, so my stockpile grows slowly. Some weeks it’s just a measly can of beans or gallon of water. I keep reminding myself that it’s like scrimping pennies for your savings account… every little bit counts. Here is a great resource on stockpiling on a budget. And as Stacy used to say, don’t forget coupons!
Gifts are another great way to add items to your stash! Don’t laugh, but here are a few things our family got for Christmas this year: emergency meals, water purification tablets, ammunition, a disaster-readiness book, and a pocket knife. And don’t tell my hubby, but he just might get some bottles of propane for Valentine’s Day. What’s hotter than propane, really? 
Once you start accumulating a stockpile, you’ll need somewhere to store it. I prefer my stash in a separate spot. Otherwise it tends to get absorbed into the normal stuff and used up. You can empty a cupboard, a pantry shelf, coat closet, even under the bed.
To keep items fresh, I read to label each item with the date you bought it in permanent marker. Every time daylight savings comes, use up the older items.
Eventually, we’d love to add to our stockpile a generator, water purification system like this one by Berkey, a battery-powered radio, and seeds.
Have you ever lost power for an extended period of time? What did you learn? What’s in your emergency stockpile?
* Want to do more research? Be sure to check out Stacy’s helpful post on GOODY bags (emergency kits). Here is my favorite book on the topic, and here is a comprehensive 52-week plan to for disaster readiness.
Click here for a printable Checklist for your stockpile —> 12 Essential Items for Emergency Stockpile – checklist
Jessica Smartt is a former middle-school teacher who lives in beautiful North Carolina. You can find her at Smartter Each Day where she enjoys poking fun at the everyday challenges of motherhood, sharing delicious allergy-free recipes, and rejoicing that God still loves her no matter what phobia she has recently developed. She is blessed beyond belief with two Smartt little boys and a husband who can fix anything.
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About Stacy
Hi, I'm Stacy! Welcome to Stacy Makes Cents! I'm a naturally-minded, frugal living mama, who likes to blog about living debt free in everyday life. Delicious (and healthy) recipes, money tips, and frugal living posts abound here! Enjoy your stay. Romans 13:8 
We lost power for two weeks during a snow storm while I was in high school. We cooked outdoors on a propane grill, and was lucky enough to have a wood stove to cook on as well. We also put perishable stuff like milk, meat ect. In buckets and packed them with snow in the porch. We survived.
Wow, this is really good. I’ve just started our stock pile with extra beans every time I go grocery shopping. We do need some sort of cooking device though, maybe I’ll just buy a propane grill. Excellent tips it gives me something to work for.
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A propane grill is excellent! Keep plenty of propane in stock.
LOL, propane for Valentines Day! Maybe frugal people aren’t very romantic – I take classes in a dicey area of the city, so I asked for mace!
Hey – I have mace…are you saying that’s not romantic? LOL
Thanks so much for posting this. I keep thinking about doing this, but haven’t. You have motivated me. I think keeping it under the bed is going to work great for me and is the motivation I need-having a set place to put it all.
Thanks again!
Under the bed is a great place! That’s what I would do if I didn’t have a basement.
i’ve just begun to collect items for my stockpile. i’ve been putting them in a labeled tote in my basement (we don’t have a pantry or dedicated shelf yet. i can only afford to do a little each week. i have a suggestion for you… it would be very helpful if you made a downloadable pdf of your list. thanks!
Good suggestion!
That IS a great suggestion! I’ll work on it!
Jessica Smartt recently posted…Whole Wheat Oatmeal Apple Muffins
Jessica, if you get it made up I’ll go ahead and put it into the post.
I learned how important water is, more than even food. We lost power after a hurricane last year, for just a few hours, 12 hours i think. We were pretty prepared (in regards to food, drinking water, and candles/flashlights) but we didn’t think that we wouldn’t have clean water for a couple of days, and we were not prepared for that.
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I really should do a post about preparing with water – it’s essential. You can live without food for a while, but you can’t live without water.
I have a small stockpile, too. Here in Kansas, we lose power in the winter from blizzards and ice storms, and in the spring, summer and fall from tornadoes and lightning-strikes. We learned to stockpile the hard way, when we lost power — and fresh water — for four days. (Thankfully, I’d filled all of the bathtubs beforehand, so we at least had that.)
One thing I make a point of stockpiling now: plastic bags. Listen, when you can’t flush the toilet and the ground is too frozen to go bury, um, stuff, you realize just HOW important plastic bags can be!
Katie B. of HousewifeHowTos.com recently posted…How To Tuesday Link Party
Good addition! I like to keep those around too – they come in SO handy!
That’s a great list! One thing we bought several years ago, that we have just really appreciated is a crank-wind radio/lantern. You have to turn the crank several turns to get a few minutes of light or radio, but it’s been invaluable. Before this, we would try to keep batteries on hand for the flashlights But they’d invariably get used up in kid’s toys.
Lili@creativesavv recently posted…January Grocery Money Journal — month-end
We had one of those! It broke….I should really get another one. The one we have now works with batteries.
You can add had/foot/body warmers to the list…not the kind you have to microwave tough. Also, a few old rags…you can wet then and tie them to cover your nose and mouth to breath through if there is a fire. The folks who went through Hurricane Sandy also dealt with fires.
Excellent additions! This is becoming a great resource!
So funny that I read this post today. I just finished listening to a great audio book entitled “Life As We Knew It”..about a natural disaster on earth and people having to survive without electricity, heat, limited food, etc. for 10 months. Just finished it today. Great book!
We try to live a simple life, grow our own veggies, raise chickens and rabbits, cook from scratch, make our own breads, etc. We also have quite a stockpile and hope that in case of an emergency, we’d be okay.
Margaret @ Live Like No One Else
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The simple isn’t easy – but it’s very fulfilling.
Wouldn’t you agree?