hillfarm

We are in the path of the current winter stormbut I doubt we will get all that much out of it. However, since we are at the end of a long, rural power line, there is always the chance that the snow will cause a limb to drop or a car to slide off into a power pole. So we activate our PLOP procedures. I do up all the laundry, vaccuum, straighten, pay special attention to possible low-light tripping hazards, cook some easy to reheat foods, make sure everyone is freshly showered regardless of their preferred bathing schedule, get plenty of firewood onto the porch, top off all the watering tanks, verify that animal food is easily accessible, prepare to set up any needed wind blocks for animals. We already have the basic preps in place, so I don't have to worry about those things, like ample meds, small bills cash, plenty of food stores, etc. Any other ideas to add to the procedure?

Thanks, everyone. I am down to 2 big boxes in the living room. One to get wrapped and go to the barn - can't collapse it down much due to all the foam packing, and the other hopefully to be gone tomorrow. I found a new home for the various pieces of furniture that needed to leave and I was so glad to see it go. This evening I hit the 3rd bedroom hard and now it is an organized pile of stuff needing done and at least half the floor space is clear. The projects piled there are long term ones that I will have to plan and schedule to complete. So...I think I have dd somewhat situated with her new schooling. I still need to go through a few more books, but they are mostly mine. I'd like to get at them though. The crowded, messy shelves make my entire living room look bad and contribute to the first impression visitors get when coming to my house. Another pending project is to sell as many of the no-longer-needed homeschooling books as possible and then give away or donate the rest (could bring in up to $300). I plan to direct that money toward replacing food storage items. Tomorrow I have an appointment with a naturopath to see if that specialty has any relief to offer with regards to my rash/Grover's Disease. I really want to avoid the heavy duty pharmaceuticals if I can. I had a very good talk with a Physician's Assistant (PA, which seem to be taking over much of American health care these days). He attends our church. He agreed with me that it was probably wise that I not chance side effects that line up with some mild but problematic tendencies I have experienced in the past. Dh's birthday is this week. He wants to go ammo shopping with some points that we earned on a credit card. Fine with me. Also a field trip for dd's new school. Such a coincidence that their first trip happens to be not far from our home. It will be good to meet some of her teachers in person and put faces with names. I'd also like to get 10 more articles written by the end of January. In my fantasy world, I'd get 20 done a week, instead of 20 a month. Our finances had become a bit grim last year when dh had to take a pay cut. But God is giving me a way to work ourselves out of this hole and I need to step up and take it. If I can get dd's schooling settled down by the end of the month, not much is scheduled for February. Maybe I can get closer to my 20/week goal then. Although I'm not quite back to being able to work my 13 in 13 plans yet, I do feel good about the progress that's been made and optimistic about the future. That's one of the things that surprised me in December, this new-found optimism. I'll enjoy it while I can!

Believe it or not, they do have a little hand waving in the air icon to answer questions during the live sessions and also a drop-down menu option called "Stepping away", to be used for brief but unavoidable absences!

Argh! I have been helping dd wander around in the cyber equivalent of a new school all day. This was her first day of attending online public school instead of traditional homeschooling. The lessons haven't been that hard, but all the thrashing about, not knowing where to find anything, is driving me crazy. I'm sure we will get it figured out eventually and get the system finetuned but for now, our first day will end up being about 10 hours long! So no writing work, no house cleaning work, no pantry organization work getting done today.

Thanks for the support. I got one desk and the shelf loaded into the car, plus an old set of encyclopedias that I didn't want but that someone guilted me into accepting. But they are out of here now! My biggest success of the day is that I got my writing done on schedule! It's just the online content writing, but I do like the freedom and the quick money. I called and got an appointment next Monday to see a naturopath about the Grover's disease. The topicals from the dermatologist just aren't getting it and they want to put me on some meds that have some nasty side effects. I will only do that as an absolute last resort, and maybe not even then. I'm really hoping this other guy can help me. He did several years ago when I was suffering from depression. So anyway, I will unload the junk wagon tonight at martial arts class - the instructor just opened a new location and can really use a new-to-him desk and shelf. I'm going to see if I can get him to take the encyclopedias to use for improvised weapons training. He showed us how to use a book defensively a while back - it was shocking to see how deadly a decent hardbacked book can be!

Thanks, everyone. I'm sad to say that I'm a member of the Migrane Sisters Society too. Had one yesterday. Normally all I get is the visual distortion, headache, and some numbness in my hands. Yesterday I also got some nausea, which really scared me that I was getting the flu instead of a migrane. But I guess not, since I feel back to about 95% today. There were a bunch of informative but tedious videos I needed to watch for orientation to dd's online school. So while each one was loading I took another load up to the 3rd bedroom - which now looks like a bomb went off there. However, the living room looks nearly back to normal, only one stray desk quietly waiting to leave tomorrow, and the big box that needs wrapped and banished to the barn.

Did you knock him over too? I'm pretty sure I would have been tempted.

Oh how I miss that halcyon period between Christmas and New Year's Day! My regular schedule was suspended and I had ample time to sit around and plan for all the great things I was going to to when "things got back to normal". But no normal yet and my house is a torn up mess. My 14yo dd is transitioning from traditional homeschooling to online school. I've bought 2 desks in the last 2 days. UPS has been here every day for the last 4 days. A new desk in dd's room means her old one is sitting in my living room, waiting until Monday for its turn to go bless someone else. Also in my living room is dd's "downstairs" desk, with her new school computer. Which means all the shelving had to shift around. One shelf lost the battle of justifying the need to keep it. So it is also in the waiting line to go elsewhere. However, its contents are sitting in piles on the floor, waiting to be carried upstairs, given away, sold, or donated. The giant "Keep This Box" that the computer came in is waiting to be well wrapped in plastic so it can go out to the barn. As you might imagine, my living room no longer looks like the launch pad for a woman who has all her cr*p together and is ready to accomplish 13 great new things in 2013. I haven't had much time at home this week, out buying desks, doncha know! I got diagnosed with Grover's disease, an itchy rash that would drive me insane if I let it. So far no meds giving me much relief that don't have dreadful side effects. The bottom line is that a week into January and all my well laid plans are lying shattered on the floor. You just can't see them for all the desks and stacks and boxes. My house is a wreck. None of my exciting and orderly plans are getting done. I need things to settle down, and I mean RIGHT NOW!

Once when I was young, I was evesdropping on my parents visiting with a neighbor in our living room. I was up in my bedroom directly above the living room, with my ear glued to one of those old fashioned passive heat register/duct things that was open to my room on the floor and open to the room below on the ceiling. I jumped up when I heard footsteps on the stairs, and accidentally ran my leg through the register hole! My mother later tells the story that they were chatting when all of a sudden, a leg popped down out of the ceiling! My dad had to come up and get me out and repair the register. Not sure if they knew about the evesdropping or not! The footsteps were from my bratty little brother, chalk one more sin against me up on the list. I agree that you should elevate the leg. If it is still sore, consider using some ice packs for about 20 minutes at a time. Each half hour, lift your leg a little higher and do some toe stretches and ankle rolls. The major way the body has of moving lymph fluid (like swelling) is through muscular contraction. I love arnica gel for bruising. HTH and good luck.

Two things for 2012. First, that my 14yo dd is no longer a child and I have to learn new ways to relate to her. Recent events have reminded me that while life with our loved ones is a very precious thing, it can be fleeting. So I remind myself of the old homeschool mantra, teach them like it is your last year with them/love them like it is their last year with you. The second thing is that although I think of myself as a fairly prepared person, when we were without power for 10 days last summer during the derecho event, I realized how badly I had dropped the ball with my preps organizationally. I needed things that I knew I had, but in a few cases it took me a day or so to lay my hands on the items. That drove me crazy. I have tried since then to make some inroads on getting things better organized, but still have a long ways to go.

Christmas Eve went fine. One uncle is dating a Vietnamese woman who makes the most amazing egg rolls. I wish I had a freezer full of those! I love it when she brings them to family get-togethers. Had a nice, quiet visit with dm on the way home. I was really tired, but glad we took the time to stop by. I hate to think of her being alone on the holidays but can't figure out how to get her to come to any of the family events since Dad died. Wow - Christmas morning with a 14yo is so much different than it was when she was 4. Back then, she was up at the crack of dawn, ready to open presents. Now she slept until almost 9:00. We opened gifts and then cooked like crazy to do brunch for dm and mil. That went well. But next year dh will probably have to go get mil and bring her out to our house. Although it is an easy drive and not complicated, she gets lost very easily now. Hope everyone had a great holiday morning and is able to rest a bit now. I'm going to put everything on charger that can be charged and then take a brief nap. Then I'll institute our possible loss of power procedures since we might get some ice and wind from this storm system coming in. (BTW, it disgusts me that someone is trying to make winter storms named storms like hurricanes are. Oh please, storms are not rock stars - neither are weather reporters) After I get up, I'll do up a couple of loads of laundry, inventory the contents of the refrigerator, perhaps make a big pot of soup, etc. Then I'll go around the house and clear the floors of any low light tripping hazards. I doubt we will get that much from this storm, but tomorrow early morning may be a bit nasty with ice and wind. Only for a couple of hours, but that is enough time to bring down some trees or limbs to damage power lines. Then it is supposed to warm up to lots of rain that could cause some low land flooding and finally a few inches of snow by late tomorrow night. Glad it held off this long.

Sadly, today is going to be the day when I need to rush myself. I need to give the house a good once over and do a good bit of last minute baking. My 14yo dd will help inside and dh has to go cut a tree that fell down on dm's driveway during the night. It looks like a pretty accessible job, so hopefully he won't need our help. I have one last thing I am waiting on to be delivered, but don't know if it will get here today or not. I had ordered some fighting gear for dd and myself from a place in the midwest that got hit by the snow storm a few days ago. Itwas supposed to by here by Christmas, but I don't know if it will make it or not. That's a little bit of a bummer, but not a crisis, since the class we need it for doesn't start until January 2. I'm still going to try to call and check, though. We have had situations in the past where UPS is cruising our area for days, unable to find us, or when they won't leave stuff on our porch. Hopefully the gear is in the vicinity, just can't quite find its way to us yet. Then off this afternoon to the holiday celebration for another branch of the family. Last night's was the "young and hip" group. Today is the "older and more sedate" group. I'm hoping to get them to identify some genealogy photos for me during the down moments. Then home to check in on my dm for Christmas Eve, then tumble into bed to wait for Santa.

Just back home from the first get-together. It went better than expected. Didn't need to smack anybody after all.(I reserve the right to revise this after checking to see what they have posted on FaceBook) I had resurrected an old recipe I hadn't made in years. I was afraid I overcooked it, since I couldn't remember what it was supposed to look like when done. But it turned out fine and was quickly gobbled up. It was a gooey cake. Not for anyone watching calories or with a preference for healthy food, but really yummy. I did get most of my wrapping done this afternoon, so I am really pleased about that. I don't want to have to stay up late tomorrow night, like I have had to do in the past.

Hello, everyone. I'm new here and other than the intro post, this is my first one. I spent much of my day today trying to figure out exactly where and when I am supposed to be for the next several days and what I'm supposed to bring to each location! I had most of the gift stuff done, but dh and dd got a little stir crazy and wanted to go to town to people watch, so we did go into the little town about 30 miles away for a couple of hours earlier. It was a bit more active than normal (I guess, how would I really know though, I'm usually never off my property after dark, especially in town!) It's late and I'd love to stay up a while and wrap a few presents, but am not sure I have the patience for it right now. I still have a load of laundry I'd like to get done and a few other things. I will probably sequester myself in my bedroom tomorrow afternoon for a while and get a bunch wrapped then. I am trying to keep the focus on our religion this holiday season and so far have had a couple of nice talks with my 14yo. Still, it can be so hard not to get caught up in the busyness of the logistics and accidentally forget the main purpose. Tomorrow after church I will bake a cake, do a few small last minute gifts, and then load up for an evening at my bil's house. I will have fun, I will smile and make small talk. I will not smack a couple of people that will probably be begging for it. Monday I will bake during the day, finish up a few odds and ends, and then load up for a big get together at dh's aunt's home. I found some very old family photos that I plan to take to see if any of the older ones there can identify for me. I like to dabble in genealogy. After that late afternoon event, we will stop by my mother's for a brief Christmas Eve visit. She doesn't like holiday celebrations much since my dad died. I can't force her to participate, but don't want to leave her alone entirely on the holidays, so I settle for a brief visit with her here and there throughout the days. Christmas morning we will open gifts at home, then my mother and mil will come for a nice brunch and to see their grandaughter's Christmas gifts. After that, my goal is to collapse for a few hours. Then we will load my mother up to drive her around to see the Christmas lights in the area. Since we live pretty far out and most places are closed on the holiday anyway, I will have to prepare a "car picnic" of snacks and hot chocolate to accompany our tour. What kinds of things are you doing for the holiday?

I came here because I was looking for a forum where I could be complex, quirky, sarcastic, strong and weak - as most women I know are - on the topic of survival. I have visited several other survival/preparedness forums but am weary of being pigeonholed due to the fact that I am female. There are a lot of areas in my life where I am fairly traditional. I am a stay-at-home mom, homeschooling my only child. We live in a rural area and while we are not off the grid, we can see the end of it from here! We don't have a furnace, we heat entirely with a woodstove. We don't have air conditioning. We live in a dumpy old farmhouse and my mother lives next door in a nice small house on a combined property (which we manage) of about 120 acres. I garden, can, sew, knit, crochet, know how to raise fiber animals and shear/process the fiber/spin/felt/weave it. I can hunt and know how to butcher animals. Because we live at the tail end of a very long power line, we often lose power. So I have plenty of experience with living without electricity. Due to the fact that the roads out here aren't the best either, we live what many refer to a preparedness lifestyle because we have to. We can't always get to town just when we would like to do so. I am also certifed as a NOAA SkyWarn weather spotter, a Red Cross disaster shelter worker, and am on a disaster response chainsaw team. Other areas of my life are not as traditional. I used to be a biologist. I speak 5 languages. I've done a fair amount of international travel. Probably the most noteworthy area of my life these days is that for some reason, I feel that God is providing my daughter and I the opportunity to become skilled warriors. I know how strange that sounds. But we have been blessed to be able to train in an amazing form of martial arts that is a combination of several traditional ones (karate, judo, juijitsu, kenpo, etc.) and a number of street fighting and combat techniques. I was able to get certified by my instructor for free to teach women's self defense. There are at least 3 law enforcement officers in the same class with us. Also, we have had the opportunity for my daughter to shoot competitively in pistol, rifle, shotgun, and archery. And to top it all off, we have had various opportunities to study, make, and train with primitive weapons such as atlatls, rabbit sticks, bolos, and blowguns. So I guess I am not exactly the typical rural mom. I'm looking for a forum of people who understand how I can calmly practice 3 new lethal neck snaps on Tuesday night, go to knitting class at church on Wednesday afternoon, and cuddle new baby lambs in a less than pristine barn stall at midnight.