Emergency Preparedness

In our church, we are counseled to be prepared for emergencies. This includes having a two-year supply of food in storage as well as 72 hours worth of emergency supplies - called a 72-hour kit. David and I have tried hard to do this. Our two-year supply is more like an 8-12 month supply, especially since we've been living off it lately, but we have done better with the 72-hour kit.

When Hurricane Rita was headed for Houston, we didn't have to rush to the store only to find empty shelves and long lines. We had everything we needed. It was amazing what a sense of calm and security that gave us. When we decided to evacuate, we just had to load everything in the tunk and we were ready to go. To be honest, I never thought we'd actually use our kits and I was so glad we had decided to follow the counsel anyway.

We use our camping gear as part of this preparedness and then we also each have a backpack with extra clothes and supplies. The camping gear gets recycled every time we go camping (about once a year). Once a year we also go through the backpacks and recycle the food, medicine and anything else that needs to be swapped out. 

This year we needed to make Baylie her own kit. While I was putting it together, it hit me that I'm not going to be able to go through her bag just once a year. I'll need to go through it every 2-3 months because she grows so quickly. I was surprised at how much stuff needed to go in her bag and I'm so glad we decided to get hers ready, rather than waiting to do it at the last minute should there be an emergency.  

Now we just have to figure out how to carry three backpacks and a baby!