The last time we talked, we were discussing the downturn of our economy, and the steps Deb and I decided to take on this account. We told of our oldest son Josh, and his family, and how their income had decreased from slowdown of their workplace along with Shelly having Gavin and being home with him.

But, by those guys having the foresight to recognize the slowdown of our economy, they started putting up some food storage. Because of this, today, even with a good bit of their income lost for the time being, they’re eating, and eating well.

By not doing as they did, at this time they’d be experiencing a “double-whammy.” This being less money available to them to buy groceries, then once reaching the stores…they’d be paying more for what they needed, plus receiving less because of the price increase. So, those two have weathered pretty well.

So you see guys, our game plan within our family is basically to prepare for the worst, but the whole while hoping for the best. Once more, what food storage we’ve put away, we couldn’t come close to replacing with today’s pricing, AND, I don’t see this changing. AND, the worst case scenario simply being…we’ll eat it anyway!

You only have to look quickly at the events unfolding in our Country, and for that matter worldwide, to understand that “we the people,” could get hung up between a rock and a hard spot fairly easily…from a number of different scenarios.

Because of this, Deb and I decided to put as much into our own hands as possible when it comes to the well being of our family. Food, water, alternative power, fuel, firewood, meds, seeds, tools, camping supplies, firewood, cookware, and even toiletries.

We both like to fish, so we have plenty of tackle, and could supplement our diet with fish or game. We put the cows on the place, and are fixing to build a greenhouse. All because of our economy, number one, and our elected leaders in Washington failing to ease our doubts of our economy turning back around in the near future…or ever, without a good “housecleaning” by… “We the People!”

I’ve touched base before on this subject, but stop for just a second or two and contemplate a remark made by our President…”We’re going to spend our way out of debt!”

As a small business owner, a family man, and a guy who is pretty frugal with a dollar, I’ve never heard of a more ludicrous statement in my entire life!

This is one of our problems…too many in our government today, with little to NO business experience. Never made a payroll, and all their decisions, no matter how asinine, financed by what they used to consider a bottomless pit, financed by… “We the People.”

Although today, “their bottomless pit,” is now on the very brink of default. We’ve let our politicians, through their power, unaccountability, and personal gain, put the greatest Country on the face of the earth, our Country, into a perilous position.

They’ve taught that you don’t have to have a work ethic! No, No! Even if you don’t, we’ll see that the ones that do, will furnish your livelihood for you. Not only that, for those that don’t, the government is going to indoctrinate you in the belief that you deserve such treatment…YOU’RE ENTITLED TO IT!

Do you remember the First Lady explaining that you DESERVE your piece of the pie too?? Well, as far as you deserving your piece of the pie, shoot, I agree with her wholeheartedly on this point. BUT, I believe we are at odds in how you get your piece of this pie.

I believe once more, that yes sir, you should have a piece of the pie, but in order to get your piece of it, there is a price to pay. The cost for this slice of pie? Hard work, sacrifice, saving what you can, and being realistic in your lifestyle. YOU EARNED YOUR SLICE OF THE PIE!

An example…a family making $25,000 a year, buying a $300,000 home. Someone please make me understand the logic behind such thoughts. But this is what our politicians today have advocated, and in many instances, FORCED lending institutions to do such as this…or else!

This is but one example of our current administration’s idea of you getting your “piece of the pie!”

Through this, with Fannie and Freddie leading the way, we almost toppled our economy with loans that they knew could never possibly be paid back, given the incomes of the people who got so many of these loans!

You know, there is a reason for lending institutions to loan money on their so called, “good loans.” COLLATERAL! By you having to put up enough collateral, this states pretty clearly that under normal circumstances, you’ll see that this money is paid back, or…you LOSE your Collateral, and whatever you purchased with the loan in the first place.

BUT, by so many of our politicians today demanding our financial institutions make loans to people who could not pay these loans back, on top of having them put into these homes with little to NO money down, they just walked off.

WHY? BECAUSE THEY HAD ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO LOSE!!

SO, what does our government do?? They start passing out billions of the taxpayer monies, or once again, money that belongs to “We the People.” Not to be given to “We the People,” but to their cohorts.

Mainly, they “bailed out” Fannie and Freddie, AIG, the Post Office, AmTrak, and the unions. The last being one of the main causes of our automotive industry’s downfall, YET, they end up with a 20% share of GM and Chrysler!

And you wonder why Deb and I decided that we just might want to start becoming a little more self-reliant?? Go figger!

Plus…these are just part of the problems we face today as a society. By you guys trying to put up a little extra each week, it may come to pass that not unlike our oldest son Josh, here in the near future, you just may be very glad that you did.

This is our point. We’re not trying to tell anyone what to do, how to do, or why you do in regards to your family. We are though, of the belief…that we are living in a very different situation as a Country today.

We’re living in a Country today that now borrows about 43% of EVERY dollar we spend. We’re living in a Country today that has debt over the $14 trillion mark.

On top of this, we’re living in a Country today that’s school systems are now “middle of the pack” worldwide. We’re living in a Country today that is slowly, but surely taking our religious freedoms away from us.

We’re living in a Country today, where a young boy in California was made to take a flag off his bicycle, for fear of it being offensive to some of the other students. His flag? THE AMERICAN FLAG!

We’re living in a Country today, where our President wouldn’t stand at attention during the playing of our National Anthem, and refused to wear a flag pin of an American Flag, for the longest time. Pressure forced him to do so, and he started doing both, BUT…it wasn’t because he wanted to! If so, wouldn’t you think he’d have done these things to start with?

We’re living in a Country today, where a gunman, a major in our armed forces, shoots and kills over 30 other soldiers on a US base… IN THE US! The gunman was Muslim, was in contact with radical clerics, and was shouting “Allah Akbar” during his massacre of his comrades in arms. Our President’s first response… “Don’t jump to conclusions.”

We’re living in a Country today, where our Speaker of the House (at one point), declared to the American people that in order for us to know or see, what was in Obama Care, we needed to…PASS IT FIRST???

We’re living in a Country today, while at probably the most lenient of times in our Country’s history in regards to racism, it is preached, advocated, pushed upon, and used incessantly by our administration, our media, community organizations, State and Local governments, and the far left. Far too many times these charges are nothing but blatant lies.

You do realize I could go on and on and on with these types of statements, but I think you see the point we’re trying to make. Also, to many I’m literally preaching to the choir, but to many more…they still seem to just…have no idea.

NO ONE, and I do mean NO ONE is better capable of taking care of their own families, than themselves! Yet our leaders have decided THAT THEY are really the only ones capable of this. My response…BULL!

Anyway, Deb and I see the goings on today in our Country, and I have to tell you all that we by NO means feel comfortable. So, these are some of the reasons why we’ve became advocates of living as much as possible in ways we can control as best we can. Self-sufficiency…that’s our goal, or as least as much as possible.

So in closing today, we’d like to ask you once more, please take a look around, and see for yourself the direction we’re headed in as a Country.

If you look long enough, and hard enough, you may decide for yourself that taking steps in your own lives to better prepare your own family may just be…the best course of action…at least for the time being!

We will continue on this topic for another time or two, then…it’s on to something else. God Bless you, and as Deb says, “Keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!”

Dub and Deb

I don’t know about the rest of you guys, but I went to the grocery store for Deb last week and dad-gum, things sure are going up in price! I literally was astounded!

Whole chickens…anywhere from 9 to 11 bucks. I couldn’t even imagine this! Carnation canned milk…$1.85 PER can! I was like…WHOA!

These are exactly the reasons we started our food storage…availability, inflation, and concern over our own ability to purchase food, IF our business continued to experience such a dramatic slowdown, like we experienced in 08.

Back when our site was started, we talked a great deal about the state of our current economy. We explained that we are in the asphalt paving business, and what a hit we took in regards to our business back in 08.

It didn’t simply slow down…IT STOPPED! Plus, it stopped for 1-1/2 years. There was no gradual easing off, as once more, it was like you just slammed on the brakes in your car.

Well, Deb and I had seen this coming, and honestly we were already in “you better pay close attention mode,” in regards to the economy. We immediately started making, “lifestyle changes,” and today are so glad we’d done this.

We knew that without work, this could very well mean we didn’t eat as well. In our belief you can’t have one without the other. First off, our misfortune is not the fault of others, but is based upon the decisions and actions we made, not someone else!

With this being the case, after beginning to see the economic downturn, and shortly afterwards we DID see, once more, we were already doing everything in our power to become much more self-sufficient, and self-reliant than we’d ever been before in our entire lives!

Now, 2-1/2 to 3 years later, boy, are we ever glad we did the things we did!

Food storage was a big concern for us, and we started researching heavily the ways in which we could store food most effectively, as well as safely.

Our choices mainly were the home canning process, and a Food Saver system. Both fit nicely into our lifestyle, and I can’t say that we really prefer one more than the other.

From a storage standpoint we really like to home can, whether it be vegetables, fruits and jellies, or meats, soups or stews. Our big like in this regard is you CAN get by with no power, if this ever takes place.

As long as they’re stored in a fairly cool, dark spot, you really don’t HAVE to have power. This is a very big plus with the home canning process. I also have come to realize that not only is this type of storage very lenient if you were to undergo any extended period of power, but that Deb and I just really like putting food up in this fashion. We enjoy the process, for whatever that’s worth! LOL!

But let me be quite honest in another regard as well. The Food Saver system we like very well too, although we do prefer most of our food storage to be home canned.

In the Food Saver process, using vegetables or meats, it does one terrific job. We Food Saver those babies, and you have just increased the food life of whatever it was you “food savered.” I read up to 5 years, maybe even more, with no freezer burn.

Power though, to Deb and I, is really of little concern. When we built our house, we also bought a 45 KW generator that will run our entire household…electricity or not. So, in case of storms, or whatever the reasoning, we have the ability to keep all our freezers and refrigerators running, insuring no frozen food loss.

This too brings up a point…diesel fuel for our generator. We considered this too. We keep our generator topped off with fuel at all times, plus we have 425 gallons of diesel stored in a mobile tank. This can be pulled to wherever it’s needed.

Now, after letting you guys in on the fact we do have diesel stored, this indeed helps us out greatly, but without too much thought, it’s pretty obvious that if times REALLY got bad, we eventually WOULD run out of diesel.

With this in mind, WHAT IF, diesel wasn’t available after using up our supply? So as you can see, this too could present a very serious problem, and one you should not overlook…in our opinion.
Our plan, if any of this were to occur is simply…rationing our fuel. In other words, although our generator is capable of running our entire home…it would not be used in such a way.

We’d spend much more time outside, number one, and number two, we’d only run our generator, possibly two to three times a day, only for keeping our refrigerators and freezers cold enough to sustain what’s in them…that’s all.

In other words…you need to become very frugal. Now this is something Deb and I have always pretty much been, but we, unlike many others understand full well, we have the ability to continue to cut corners anyway we can.

Something else our Food Saver allows us to do, is to store complete meals in our freezers. This mainly for convenience.

If you’ll start cooking from time to time, meals that are heavy prep, heavy mess, and heavy time consuming…we make up more than we could possibly eat in just a sitting or two. This allows us to Food Saver up complete meals that only have to be taken out of the fridge, thawed, and then heated. In just a short period of time you have a complete nutritious meal! This is great for a household where both Mom and Pop are in the workplace.

Another thing we use our Food Saver for, is storing dried peas, beans, sugar, salt, corn meal, flour, pasta, and even grits.

We Food Saver these, and then we put them in food grade 5-gallon buckets with sealable lids. Each bucket we use for the storing of these items holds about 20 pounds of food. Each package we Food Saver holds about three cups of whatever item we’re storing at the time. This again is for…convenience and easy access.

Our procedure for these, are all simple, but with a few of these there are precautions to take. These mainly are your rice, flour, corn meal, and grits.

These we strongly suggest you freezing for 3-4 days. This kills any bugs, or eggs, that may have gotten into the items while they were being packaged, or even picked up through the shipping process while getting them to the stores.

I wouldn’t say that this is indeed mandatory, but it is something we practice at all times. We do freeze these before Food Savering, each and every time!

Let me give you a good example of the importance to try a pick up a little extra each week. This is pertaining to our family specifically, and shows the importance of what we’re discussing today.

Our oldest son Josh, and his family, have done really well in taking some of their income and putting up some food each week. Josh started storing extra about the same time that Deb and I did, and actually amazed Deb and I with the amount they put up in relatively a short period of time.

Josh works for a tire company, and was used to receiving bonuses on the number of new tires he sold monthly. Some of these checks were fairly considerable amounts, and supplemented their salary. His wife Shelly worked too during this time.

Well, the economy took a big hit, and all of a sudden the number of new tires being sold dropped off…A LOT! This had a big, big effect on his ability to supplement his income as he had been doing previously. Then Shelly became pregnant, and stopped working.

Suddenly they were faced with a big loss of income through no more or very little bonus, and the loss of Shelly’s income to boot. Things changed swiftly, and this had a huge consequence in their lives. BUT…they had food.

Again, those two had put up quite a bit, and what they couldn’t keep at their house, due to lack of room, the rest they brought down here to our place, and stored it in our food storage room we built.
As of today, their work has still not picked back up to anywhere near what it had been, people are now buying used tires mainly, again, this because of our economy, but Josh and family are still eating quite well.

Once more, they too had the best interests of their own family at heart, and took the initiative to do something about it. By doing so, they are weathering all this, pretty well. They did tell Deb that they had about eaten all they could store at their place, and before long they’d have to pick up some of their storage from here. This makes no matter at all, and we’re glad we had the room to store most of their food supply here for them.

But you see my point. Although they’re having it tough, they are still eating, and eating quite well to be honest. Only by having the foresight, and sacrificing many weeks I’m sure, to be able to put up some food, at this point today, they are very, very happy they had done so.

Through their own actions, they insured that they, and their three boys, had nutritious meals even though their income had dropped substantially.

So over the next few days, we’re going to drop back, and emphasis once again, the things that Deb and I have done in regards to our family and friends ability to survive, even in tough, tough economic times.

We hope that through this we may be able to help out others who aren’t sure of some of the things they need to be doing, or even why they need to be doing them. We don’t claim to know, by any means, everything you need to know, but we are pretty astute in many areas of this topic.

If you guys, during these next few conversations we’ll be having with you, have any ideas, suggestions, or experience in such as this, please feel free to express them. I know that what you have to contribute will be much appreciated by all!

In closing today, please know how grateful we are for your continuing to drop in a see us. We appreciate your doing so, and we wish each and every one of you the very best in all you do!

God Bless you guys, and Deb says to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb