Friday, May 16, 2008

A long blog on Food Storage




For years the topic of food storage for me was something I didn't really pay much attention to. For one thing, you can't store much food when you live in an apartment that is so small you barely have enough space for the food you normally use say nothing of food storage. Also, it was one of those things that people vaguely talked about in church that some prophet a while back said that we should have.
As you can tell from the pictures of some of our newly acquired wheat pictured above, my attitude has recently changed. It started when I was made aware of the fact that food prices (wheat in particular) were skyrocketing. The price of white wheat is so high in fact that the LDS storehouses/dry packs no longer sell it. There was a wheat-acquiring frenzy that went on in Utah when this was announced and there were severe restrictions placed on what people could buy. I didn't have that problem here in California and I went to my local LDS storehouse and bought the very last of their white wheat (500 lbs of it). According to the church website's food storage calculator, this is only enough wheat for 4 people for 6 months. Since all I currently have for food storage is wheat, my tiny garden (pictured above), and extras of food we already eat, I still have a long ways to go, but it's a start. Since I now live in a house and and room to store it, I no longer have an excuse not to. And considering the fact that we have been told quite a few times in just the past year by our first presidency (in the All Is Safely Gathered In pamphlet) which was distributed to members, and the very straight-forward talk given in April 07 General Conference, I can no longer put off the prophet's counsel.
So, I've learned a lot about using oxygen absorbers and mylar bags as we packaged up our wheat to put in long term storage. I personally don't believe that I will be needing to use it (or any other of the long-term food storage I intend to buy) any time soon, but I'll store it because we were specifically instructed to do so in 2007. In the meantime, I'll have to deal with a little less closet space.

6 comments:

snlbarney said...

Next step: 1,000 recipes for using wheat:) Good for you guys, we are slowly doing our part - it is hard, and can be expensive - baby steps are the way to go:)

Andy & Jen said...

You are officially "FOOD STORAGE QUEEN"! I am so impressed. We have 72 hour kits...does that count?

Anonymous said...

I totally know what you mean about living in an apt and not having much room for food storage. But in light of the many natural disasters that seem to be happening as of late as well as council from church leadership, we started storing water and food. While it isn't 500 lbs of wheat, we're working on what we can fit in our apt.

Amanda said...

That is so great! I don't have any food storage, besides what I have in my cuppoard. So.....my new quest is to start food storage. I have thought about it a lot lately. I just need to do it now!

My garden is going good...does that count!?

Chad said...

Is Stevo pouring the wheat from one bag into another? What's the diff?

megan said...

Look at that wheat!! You'll have to give me tips on the bags and oxygen bags, etc. You are a good motivator! And I LOVE the picture of Kiera with her bandanna- she is adorable!! And goodness gracious with your medical expenses! Thank goodness for insurance!