Oops!  I started this post back in December, and then never finished it….

Anywho, over the holidays I was working on improving my emergency preparedness situation.  Besides my grab-and-go backpack, I put together three bins that contain emergency supplies for three days:

The bins are stored in my garage, with nothing stacked on top of them, so that in the event of an emergency where I need to get the snap out of here, I can quickly toss them in the car.

One bin contains six gallons of water.

That is about as much as I can lift.  Since water doesn’t have an expiration date, I labeled each jug with the date that I purchased the water.  I’ll replace it at some point, but I haven’t yet researched how long bottled water lasts.  A while, I’m guessing.  As for additional water needs, there is a surplus store nearby that sells, well, all kinds of things, but it also sells food grade bins and barrels, so I plan to get a couple of water barrels to store water for home-emergency use.

The next bin contains food.

Camping stove and fuel (though fuel is not actually stored in the food bin, it is stored in the next bin), cooking pot, beef jerky, canned fruit, granola bars, crackers, and fruit snacks, and the black bag is full of canned soup and tuna and stuff like that.

Bin number three contains everything in the “other” category:  candles, matches, first aid kit (plus tea tree oil and hydrogen peroxide), hand sanitizer, laundry soap, rope, metal water bottle, dog food, a blanket that has one waterproof side (the black thing at the bottom of the pile on the right), towels, and extra clothes in the red bag.

Above are the contents of the red bag.  Jeans, a couple of pairs of socks, a couple of tank tops, tshirt, wool sweater, and leggings.  Not pictured are extra undies, as I didn’t really think it made sense to post pics of my undies on the interwebs.  Anywho, this clothing bag wouldn’t exactly get me through a snow storm (which is fine, since we don’t get snow here), but if I was in a situation where I just needed fresh socks and a sweater, I’d be okay.  Plus, there are more warm clothes in my emergency backpack (which would also go along with the bins in an emergency), so between the two, I’d be covered.  Literally.

None of the bins are at capacity, so there is still room for more. I also plan to store my sleeping bag in this bin, since I rarely use it anyway.

Going forward, I plan to reevaluate my emergency goods every six months, replacing, adding and subtracting as needed.  Next up, the bag I keep in my car!