Preparing NOW for Winter with Covid-19

Preparing NOW for Winter

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I think I am a prepper at heart.

I definitely lean towards having plenty for our family on hand.

Which has been such a blessing!

It gives me such peace of mind.

Especially with everything that happened with the recent (so called) pandemic, the importance of being stocked up has become even more real.

I think as homesteaders, having plenty of food and supplies on hand just comes naturally.

It is wise to prepare now, instead of waiting until you are in need and the stores are possibly closed again.

Regardless of what is happening in our country right now, it is good to have somewhat of a storage of food and supplies.

I’m always shocked when I hear that people have to go to the grocery store every week because that’s all the food they have in their homes. Before the pandemic, we would usually have at least 6 months of food in our storage that I would rotate through. Especially if we rationed it out, it would last us a nice long time.

Now, after the scare of covid-19, we have probably a year’s worth of food in our house. And a lot of it was food from our garden or from local farmers that I preserved myself.

Covid is not as serious as the media tries to make you believe. But it is still a possibility that stores may close down again. So regardless of your beliefs on what is actually going on right now, we must be ready. I think more people are seeing the importance of being prepared.

Watch this on YouTube!

Food Storage

Always buy a little extra

One way to slowly and affordable build up your food storage is to just buy a little extra each time.

So when you are at the store buying rice, just get an extra bag or two to put into storage. Grab some extra sugar, salt, olive oil, or flour.

It doesn’t have to be a lot, but if you make this a habit, after awhile you will have a nice supply of food.

I hear a lot of times that someone may not have a food supply because they are concerned about money. But by doing it this way, you are spreading the cost out over a long time. Don’t just go out and buy a year’s worth of food and spend all your money at once (unless you have the means to do that).

Just slowly build it up.

It will be much more affordable, and a lot less overwhelming.

Listen to this on your favorite podcast app!

Buy in bulk

Buy bulk as much as you possibly can.

Meat, grains, sugar, honey, vinegar, oil whatever foods you buy, find a place that sells them in bulk.

Buying in bulk and creating your food storage doesn’t mean that all this food is going to go bad just because you have extra.

You are just not going to have to buy them for awhile.

Which puts you in a really good position if they get a little scarce.

Obviously bulk is usually a lot cheaper than buying just a couple servings of something, so this is a wise thing to do.

We are to the point now where I literally buy all our food in bulk, I either get it from Azure Standard or Costco for the most part.

And that allows us to eat healthy and build up a food storage for a lot cheaper.

Make a sourdough starter

One thing that was very hard to find during the first wave this spring was yeast.

Thankfully that wasn’t a concern for us, because during the winter I had gotten myself a sourdough starter.

His name is Glenn.

Yes, I’m one of those weird people who names their sourdough starter.

But now you just let your starter rise your bread for you and it gives you the added benefit of fermenting the grain in the bread, which makes it easier to digest.

Buy bulk animal feed

Also, do this for your animal feed. Buying this in bulk is going to be a lot cheaper in the long run and I always feel good knowing the chickens and rabbits won’t go hungry.

A great way that we have been making the chicken feed go longer is by soaking it. That way they are able to digest all of it easier and they won’t go through as much of it.

Also supplement your animals with kitchen scraps and whatever you can find, instead of letting them go to waste. We throw all our scraps in the compost bin that is in the chicken yard. So the chickens eat all they can, and then whatever they leave gets turned into soil for the garden.

Food storage materials

With buying food in bulk, you need to think about ways to store them. Buying some sort of containers will keep the food good a lot longer and also keep mice away from it.

Buckets with gamma seals

We use big 5 gallon buckets with gamma seals for the most part. That is what I use to store our oats, rice, beans, flaxseed meal, einkorn berries, and water glassed eggs.

Storage bags

Mylar bags with oxygen absorbents are a great option as well for dry food storage. As well as freezer bags for any food you want to preserve that way. I personally like using canning jars for freezer storage, but you have to have a lot of them.

Canning

That brings me to my single favorite food storage solution, and that is canning. It is really important to get your hands on as many jars and lids as you can find now, because they are really scarce.

I have several hundred jars and I am always on the lookout for good deals on more of them. I usually find deals at garage sales and facebook marketplace. Just know what jars are worth in your area before you go shopping for them.

Lids have been impossible to find this year. A lot of people are panicking and buying up lids even if they aren’t using them, unfortunately. I previously had always bought them at our local ace hardware, but they have been completely out.

So I resorted to good online deals. Lehman’s has a nice bulk option for both sizes that I ordered earlier in the spring. Uline has some good deals on regular mouth lids.

I also am going to try the reusable lids this year. So I ordered some of each size from this Tattler’s reusable lid shop.

But definitely check your local stores first, because the online options won’t be there for long.

Honestly, whenever I find any jars or lids I’ve been buying them, because I’ll definitely use them and I don’t know when I’ll find more.

Dehydrate or freeze dry food

I love to dehydrate a lot of fruits, it is a good option especially if you are low on canning supplies.

It makes excellent snacks that are still nice and healthy. We enjoy dehydrating bananas, apples, pears, pineapples, strawberries, etc.

Look for good deals on fruit from your local orchard or farm store. A lot of times farmers will sell imperfect fruit for really cheap. Which is great, because we don’t need the food to look pretty to be in our storage or fill us up!

So make sure you keep that in mind if you didn’t plant a garden (or just did a small one), but you still want to preserve some food.

Seeds

If you are planting a garden, and using the produce as some of your family’s food for the year, make sure you have your seeds now.

Having seeds for next year, and possibly some for the year after will really come in handy.

This last spring a lot of the seed stores completely sold out! And now that more people are preparing and planting gardens, it might be difficult to find some next spring as well.

Our two favorite online seed stores are Baker creek and MI gardener. They both have nice, high quality seeds with good heirloom variety options

If you need some help figuring out how much you need to plant for your family for the year, Melissa K Norris has a chart for that, and a video on it.

Water filtration system

Whether or not there is a pandemic or a natural disaster, every single year, there are cities that have water bans for months at a time because the water becomes contaminated.

A water filtration system is extremely important.

We have a Berkey water filtration system and even now we use it ALL THE TIME. We are on city water and they put fluoride and other chemicals in city water. That is definitely something I don’t want me or my family to drink all day.

I cannot stress enough, how important it is to have some sort of a water filter. We even have the straw water filters in our cars in emergency bags.

But if there is another lockdown or a grid down situation, this will be extremely important to have.

And also if you can afford it, make sure you buy extra filters. The Berkey filters do last for around 4 years or more, and we have two that are probably 6 months old, but I will probably order a couple more soon.

Home products

Cleaning

I clean everything with vinegar and essential oils. So I’ve made sure to get extra of those things, I just bought a 5-gallon bucket of vinegar from Azure last time I ordered.

But if you use other store-bought cleaners, you might want to get a couple extra.

Buy a bunch of soap bars, and shampoos. Or learn to make your own and then stock up on some oil and lye!

Paper goods

This includes things like paper towels and toilet paper if you need them. When the pandemic first started, toilet paper was a rarity. So make sure you have some on hand, but again, don’t go out and buy a year’s worth. Just get some extra every time you go.

Practice some moderation with it.

Thankfully, years ago we stopped buying paper towels and I have cloth towels and rags that I use for all that stuff. We use cloths instead of napkins and kleenex as well. And more recently I have switched over the majority of our toilet paper needs to cloth wipes.

I tend to try to be as low-waste as possible in general, so that has really helped us with the recent events. Because even though toilet paper may be low, we can easily do without it.

Baby supplies

I know not everyone is going to have to think about this, but I definitely do as a mama.

But if you are pregnant, or even thinking about getting pregnant soon, you should consider this.

So get stocked up on baby clothes. I have enough clothes for the two kids to last until they are 5, and they are some of each gender so they’ll last through all our future children too.

Get some baby shampoo/soap. I use diluted castile soap because it is gentle and I have it anyway to use for dish and hand soap. Also, think about diaper rash cream, I make my own, and my recipe is here on the channel.

Cloth diapers + wipes

This is something that is on my mind because I have two children in diapers currently. My daughter Sofia who is 22 months, and my son Dimitrius who is 7 months.

I have almost exclusively cloth diapered both of them their entire lives (besides for a week or two as newborns). This has not only saved us hundreds of dollars, but I don’t have to worry about finding disposable diapers at the store. And I can also hand wash and hang them to try if the electricity ever went out.

I have a ton of info on cloth diapering in this YouTube playlist if you are considering it, but have no idea where to start. I also have my cloth diapering supplies in my Amazon storefront.

But if you don’t cloth diaper then make sure you get plenty of disposables. And it might be good to have a few cloth just in case.

Feminine care

Make sure you have everything you need for your menstrual cycle, I personally use cloth pads or a diva cup for my bleeding.

If you are pregnant, I’d recommend getting a home birth kit. Even if you are planning a hospital or birth center birth, you just never know if they will be open when you go into labor. I’ve had two home births (one unassisted), and I talk about what I have for birth supplies in THIS video and postpartum supplies in THIS one.

Also for breastfeeding moms (or soon to be breastfeeding), think about what you would need for something like mastitis. Antibiotics might be in short supply if the virus does get worse, and also research what you would need for natural remedies.

For moms who plan on formula feeding, think about actually breastfeeding. Any formula might be in short supply, and breast milk is just always there without you having to worry about the store running out.

Remedies

For baby

Have some home remedy ingredients on hand for things like ear infections:

Or teething pain:

Also, have some generic baby Tylenol or aspirin on hand. Even if you don’t generally use them (I don’t unless they have a fever), it is nice to have them, because you never know!

I know Tylenol is horrible.

I hate it.

But sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do.

If you are concerned about it, take some milk thistle capsules at the same time as the Tylenol, and that will protect your liver.

Herbal remedies

Man I love my herbal remedies!

I love growing as many as I can myself.

I am absolutely fascinated by herbalism!

It is too late in the year here in Montana to start an outdoor herb garden, but you can totally start an indoor one.

Get yourself some pots and seeds and grow herbs in your windowsill!

And for herbs that you can’t grow, make sure you buy them in bulk.

Elderberries are going to be super hard to find, so I made sure to buy like 3lbs this summer and that’ll last us most of the winter. There will also be a shortage of mullein, astragalus, rosehips, and a lot of those immune-boosting and respiratory herbs. For things like that, try to find some places to buy them dried and in bulk while you can.

If you are growing them, learn how to best preserve them.

Start making your elderberry syrup and taking it daily (we usually start in September). There is very promising research that shows that elderberries can prevent the covid virus from attaching to your cellular wall. We know for a fact it protects against the flu and can help shorten the duration of it as well. Astragalus is a major immune-boosting herb as well.

Mullein is fabulous for respiratory health. You can smoke it and it’ll clear out anything in your chest. It will get rid of any excess mucus in your chest which is really important when it comes to covid. It is antibacterial and antiviral, and it has been proven to get rid of mycobacteria.

So those are all very important for your remedy cabinet for this fall and winter.

Also, not related to immune boosting herbs, I also always have red raspberry leaf on hand. This has an important place in traditional and folk medicine for its use as an herb for women – specifically, during pregnancy and also menstrual cycles.

So since I’m in my baby havin’ years I keep a lot of this around. Especially since I’ve also found that it is very helpful for period cramps and regulating your hormones. My pregnancy herbal tea blend recipe is HERE.

Essential oils

I am a huge essential oil junkie.

I just love em!

They are a huge part of my natural medicine cabinet so I’ve made sure to stock up on the main oils.

I get mine from doTerra and I know they have had extra long shipping, so I never wait until I am in need of them. I always do it plenty in advance. Which I do anyway, but even more so now.

I recently got a box with lavender, peppermint, tea tree, and lemon because those are my most used oils and that’ll last me for months.

If you are on medication…

If you are on any prescription medication, be sure to stock up on that for a nice long chunk of time. Especially if it is something serious, this should be a huge priority for you.

I have grave’s disease, and I manage it through diet and herbs. So I will be stocking up on the herbal tinctures that I get from my naturopath.

EMT grade first aid kit

We may not have the healthcare system at our fingertips at some point.

So it is important to have a good first aid kit and learn how to handle minor ailments and wounds at home.

You just should have things on hand like, bandages, pain killer, alcohol like vodka, rubbing alcohol, sutures, etc. Even if you never use it, it’s worth keeping around just for how useful it will be if someone gets hurt.

Of course there are plenty of other things that you could use.

But that would be a crazy long blog post!

Just think of the things that your family goes through, plus some emergency items, and stock up on those.

Simple, huh?

Just kidding!

I just hope this wasn’t too overwhelming.

I know it was a little for me even writing it out and thinking about it all at once!

But just take it one step at a time at a time, and you won’t regret it.

This is more of a lifestyle change than something you just do once, just for covid-19. Just focus on one category at a time, and then one item at a time. Slowly, as you just go about your life, add to your stash. When you go to the store, just buy one extra can of food. It doesn’t have to be overwhelming or expensive, just a slow mindset change.

And blessings.

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