“Mother’s Day Surprise!" After a good laugh there's a nice video and story below!

From the "FRIEND" 1988...

As soon as Brother Hansen said the closing prayer in church and the girls started handing out flowers to the mothers, I knew that we had forgotten. I looked down the bench at my brothers, Alma, Jarom, and Jared. Alma shrugged his shoulders. Jarom looked back at me with a sad frown on his face. Jared, who’s just two and a half, whispered, “What’s wrong, Aaron?”

“It’s Mother’s Day,” I muttered.

As we walked out of the chapel, I poked Alma with my elbow. “What are we going to do?” I asked him.

Alma shook his head, but I could tell that he was thinking hard.

Just then Dad touched me on the arm. “Aaron, Mom and I have a meeting for a few minutes. Do you boys want to wait here until we’re finished?”

Our house is just a little way from the ward, so I said, “We’ll walk home.”

“And we’ll take Jared with us,” Alma added.

Alma took Jared by the hand, and I took Jarom, and we headed home. Alma and Jared walked faster than Jarom and I, so by the time Jarom and I made it to our bedroom, Alma had all his money dumped out on the bed.

“Get your money,” he told Jarom and me.

It wasn’t long until all our money was piled in the middle of Alma’s bed, even Jared’s twenty-eight pennies.

Alma dropped to his knees, spread the money out, and started counting. He scratched his head and chewed his tongue a lot. Finally he scraped all the money into one big pile and announced, “There’s seven dollars and eighty-nine cents.”

“Is that a lot?” I asked.

Alma nodded.

“How much is it?” Jarom asked.

Alma tugged on his ear. “It could buy about twenty candy bars.”

“I want a candy bar,” Jared said.

“How much gum?” Jarom wanted to know.

“Maybe twenty-five or thirty packages. Or if we got it out of the gum-ball machines, we could each get a couple of pockets full.”

“I want some gum,” Jared said.

“Are we getting Mom gum or candy bars?” Jarom asked.

“I don’t think Mom would like candy bars or gum for a present.”

“What would she like?” Jarom asked.

“A dress or a purse or perfume or stuff like that,” Alma said.

“Are we going to buy junk like that?” I asked.

“Well, Aaron, it’s Mother’s Day. We have to get her something that she likes.”

“I think we ought to get her something good,” I growled.

“Yeah,” Jarom said. “If we get a purse she might not want it. Then she’ll just put it in the closet, and it won’t be any good to anybody. But if we get a lot of gum, even if she doesn’t like it, we can chew it for her.”

“I think that we can get a pretty good dress for five dollars,” Alma said. “With all our money we might even be able to get her some gum and candy bars too.”

“Let’s get the candy bars first,” Jarom grumbled. “Then if we have enough money, we can get a dress or something.”

“We can’t get her anything today,” I said, suddenly remembering. “Today’s Sunday. We don’t buy things on Sunday.”

We all looked at each other and sat down on the edge of the bed to think.

“I know,” I called out. “We can still give her the money, and tomorrow she can buy whatever she wants.”

We took the money, dumped it into an envelope, licked the flap, and closed it. Alma got a crayon and wrote, “To Mom from the boys.”

“But we have to do something for her today, too,” I mumbled. “Today’s Mother’s Day, not tomorrow.”

“I’m hungry,” Jared whined.

“That’s it!” Alma grinned. “We’ll fix a Mother’s Day dinner.”

Jarom and I looked at each other and then at Alma.

“I don’t know how to fix dinner,” Jarom said sadly.

“We can do it,” Alma said with a grin. “We’ll have the best Mother’s Day dinner ever.”

Jarom, Alma, and I changed our clothes, then we helped Jared change his. While Alma and Jarom worked on his bottom end, pulling off his shoes and pants, I worked on his top end and jerked off his shirt. It was pretty hard work because Jared thought that we were playing a game. But we finally got the job done.

A few minutes later we were all in the kitchen. Alma pulled open the fridge door, and we looked inside.

“Mom was going to have fried chicken and potatoes,” Jarom said.

“Do you know how to make fried chicken?” I asked Alma.

“No, but we don’t have to fix fried chicken. This is going to be a special dinner. We can fix anything we want.”

“I like peanut butter sandwiches,” Jared said.

“You don’t have peanut butter sandwiches for Sunday dinner,” I protested.

“Sure we can,” Alma said, still grinning. “Peanut butter sandwiches are good for you. Mom said so.”

“What do you want?” I asked Jarom.

He ran over to the pantry, stared at the shelves stacked with cans, and brought out a big can of pork and beans.

“I want baloney in it,” I said, grabbing a package of it from the fridge.

“OK,” Alma said, “but let’s hurry and fix everything before Mom and Dad get home.”

I helped Jarom open his can of pork and beans, and we dumped them into a bowl. Then we took the baloney slices, tore them into pieces, and mixed them in with the pork and beans.

Jared got out one of Mom’s loaves of bread, Alma cut it into slices. He got only eight slices out of the whole loaf.

“Aren’t the slices just a little thick?” I asked.

He laughed and shook his head. “Dad likes them thick.”

“But this is for Mother’s Day,” I pointed out.

“Well, we’ll just have to make open-face sandwiches and put on an extra layer of peanut butter.”

“What’s for dessert?” Jarom wanted to know, as Jared and Alma started digging out gobs of peanut butter and spreading it on the bread.

“Yeah,” I said, “we have to have dessert, especially on Mother’s Day.”

Jarom ran to the pantry and came back with two cans of applesauce.

Alma looked at me, shrugged his shoulders, and said, “Looks good to me.”

“I want banana slices in it,” I said.

“And I want marshmallows in it,” Jarom insisted.

“All right,” Alma agreed, “but hurry!”

I dumped the applesauce into a bowl, then took two bananas and cut them up, dropping the chunks into the applesauce. I dumped half a bag of little marshmallows into it, too, then ran to get a spoon. When I got back, Jared was already stirring everything with his hands.

“Let’s set the table, now,” Alma called, putting the peanut butter sandwiches on the table. “Since this is such a special day, let’s use paper plates and cups and plastic spoons so that Mom doesn’t have to do the dishes.”

“We could do the dishes,” I said.

“Then let’s use paper plates for sure,” Jarom mumbled. “Then nobody will have to do the dishes.”

Just as I finished putting the plastic spoons on the table, we heard Mom and Dad pull up in the car. “Let’s hide,” Alma whispered. “When they come in, we’ll jump out and yell ‘Happy Mother’s Day!’ ”

Jared hid behind the couch, Alma and Jarom hid in the closet, and I ran into the bathroom and lay in the tub. We heard the front door open and close and Mom say, “It surely sounds quiet. I wonder what the boys are doing.”

“Maybe they went over to the Cauleys,” Dad suggested.

When Mom headed for the kitchen, we all ran out screaming, “Happy Mother’s Day! Happy Mother’s Day!”

Mom jumped and Dad laughed and grabbed Jared and put him on his shoulder.

“Who fixed dinner?” Mom gasped, looking at the food on the table.

“We did,” Alma said, beaming.

“And it’s the best dinner ever,” Jarom said with a grin.

“Probably even better than dinner at a restaurant,” I bragged.

“I helped,” Jared shouted, wiggling out of Dad’s arms. “Let’s eat,” he added, pushing his high chair up to the table.

After we sat down, Alma exclaimed, “Oh, we forgot something!” He jumped down from his chair and ran into our bedroom. A few seconds later he dropped the money envelope onto the table—CLUNK!

Mom took one look inside and gasped, “Oh, you shouldn’t have. It’s all your money.”

“But it’s Mother’s Day,” I cried, “and nothing’s too good for you, Mom.”

“I’m hungry,” Jared shouted, banging on the high chair with his spoon. “Let’s say the blessing.”

“Was it a good Mother’s Day dinner?” Jarom asked when we were all finished.

Mom came around the table and gave us each a hug and a kiss. “That’s the very best Mother’s Day dinner that I’ve ever eaten,” she told us.

The Top 50 Things to Disappear from Store Shelves during an Emergency

Have you ever noticed how, whenever a big storm is predicted, people start rushing to stores to clean them out of ever food item and supply they have on the shelves? In one sense, it’s probably good that they are trying to anticipate the emergency, despite being last-minute about it. It sure beats those people who don’t bother to prepare at all, then complain when emergency services are overwhelmed by requests for assistance.

But why panic in the first place? Why not have a stash of necessary items always ready for such an emergency? Even if there isn’t a storm approaching, it’s nice to know that you don’t have to rush out to the store every time you run out of toilet paper. Keeping some extra around the house is always a good idea!

With this in mind, I decided to ask CampingSurvival.com’s Facebook fans what they felt were the emergency supplies that stores were most likely to run out of when people start to panic. Then I compiled the top comments in various categories so I could share it with you. Since this list is based on the comments of our Facebook fan page, some of the items (canned meat, for instance) may not be the absolute first things for a store to run out of, but are still items that you should consider having among your emergency supplies nonetheless.

Without further ado, here the list of the Top 50 Things to Disappear from Store Shelves during an Emergency, compiled by yours truly:

FOOD

1. Bread
2. Butter
3. Cereal
4. Coffee
5. Eggs
6. Flour
7. Fruit, canned and fresh
8. Honey
9. Meats, canned
10. Milk
11. Peanut butter
12. Pet food
13. Salt
14. Sugar
15. Vegetables, canned and root vegetables
16. Water

POWER AND LIGHT

1. Batteries
2. Candles
3. Charcoal
4. Coolers
5. Flashlights
6. Gasoline
7. Generators
8. Glow sticks
9. Ice
10. Lamp oil and oil lanterns
11. Lighter fluid
12. Matches
13. Propane, propane stoves

FUN

1. Alcohol, drinking
2. Beer
3. Cigarettes

FIRST AID

1. Alcohol, rubbing
2. Antiseptic
3. Aspirin/pain relievers
4. Cold medicine
5. First aid kits

HYGIENE

1. Feminine hygiene products
2. Paper plates/napkins
3. Shampoo
4. Soap
5. Toilet paper

BABIES

1. Baby food/formula
2. Diapers

IMPROVISATION

1. Duct tape
2. Plastic bags
3. Plywood
4. Radios
5. Rope

Now, before you file this away as mildly interesting reading, take this list and compare it to what you have stocked up. Check to see what you may be missing or what you need more of. And don’t forget that this is only a Top 50 list, so there are plenty of other items.

4 Lessons from living through a severe water shortage

I wanted to share with you a learning situation my family and I had the weekend of Thanksgiving. We have been working on our disaster preparedness over the last few years, but this situation helped to show us some kinks in our armor.

We live out on 5 acres with a well for our water supply. One day I walked out into our garage to find water gushing out of the pressure release valve on our water storage tank. The hose that should have been connected to direct the water outside had been removed because it was in the way.

After rushing around to find any hose, we attempted to connect the hose. If you have ever tried to attach a hose to a water source on full blast you can imagine that we were thoroughly soaked before we could get it attached.

Shortly after successfully connecting the hose we found the end had a spray gun restricting the flow. With two tool boxes in the garage we could not find a pair of vise grips with which to help us remove the spray gun. We were forced to sever the hose with a pocket knife. My husband then walked down the very steep and long hill to the bottom of our property to shut off the pump still trying to flood our garage.

Little did we realize at the time, that we could have turn off the signal to the pump house by pulling the power cord to the electronic eye that is plugged in right next to the water tank.

We spent about four days without water. Since it was a holiday weekend there was no one who could help us. Everyone was closed or out of town. Our tank had punctured its bladder and needed to be replaced and there was nothing my husband and I could do while we waited. We still had to go to work and continue our normal lives. Since I had been storing water, I decided this was a test of our preparedness and refused to buy water unless absolutely necessary. I also chose not to drive to my mother’s for a shower.

We started practicing the old adage “If its yellow let it mellow”; of course, I had just started my period, so frequently I HAD to flush. I quickly discovered that our toilet takes no less than 4 gallons of water to flush. Since all the water I had stored was purchased drinking water, it cost me almost $4 a flush! 

LESSON #1: STORE ANY KIND OF WATER; JUST LABEL IT AS “DO NOT DRINK”.

Now I fill used bleach bottles, vinegar bottles, etc. I was very lucky in the fact I could fit a gallon bottle of water into my microwave to heat for bathing. I quickly discovered it takes less than 1 gallon of water to wash my body and long hair. I would collect the run off and pour it in the toilet tank.

LESSON #2: WE WASTE A LOT OF WATER DURING OUR DAILY HABITS.

If we experienced a financial crisis, we could save propane by heating less water for bathing. Our water tank holds 82-gallons and we routinely drain that for a shower. What a waste in a time of crisis! 

I was not prepared when it came to the laundry situation. Since I still had to go to work, I had to hand wash my work uniform. I work around food and my uniforms do not lend well toward wearing twice before washing. Hand washing everything but pants is easy. Pants take at least a gallon of water or more to wash because they soak up so much.

LESSON #3: DON’T LET YOUR LAUNDRY OR DISHES GET BEHIND! YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN YOUR POWER OR WATER WILL GO OUT.

LESSON#4: KEEP TOOL BOXES STOCKED WITH BASIC TOOLS, AND WHEN YOU USE A TOOL, PUT IT BACK AFTERWARDS.

So after our mini water crisis, my family and I discussed how we could have improved our situation in the event of a very long term water crisis.

One of the first things I started doing was collecting water that wasn’t just for drinking. 

Second, I decided that we needed a non-water based waste collection solution. I told my husband and son that next time we would use a bag in a bucket and kitty-litter for our toilet needs. Both of them turned their noses up and said they would rather go outside, as my 10-year old son put it, “Mom, I’m a boy, I can do that!” Funny, I don’t find the kitty-litter idea so bad.

Third, I really need to invest in some water barrels outside and water filters so we can drink it in the time of need.

Insect Bites And Stings

In a survival scenario, you will see a million insects for every snake; so many, indeed, that you can expect to regularly get bitten by them. Insect bites usually cause pain with local redness, itching, and swelling but are rarely life-threatening.

The exceptions are black widow spiders, brown recluse spiders, and various caterpillars and scorpions. Many of these bites can inject toxins that could cause serious damage. Of course, we are talking about the bite itself, not disease that may be passed on by the insect. We will discuss that subject in the section on mosquito-borne illness. In this article, we’ll talk about bees, wasps, and hornets.

Bee/Wasp/Hornet Stings

Stinging insects can be annoyances, but for up to 3% of the population, they can be life-threatening. In the United States, 40-50 deaths a year are caused by hypersensitivity reactions.

For most victims, the offender will be a bee, wasp or hornet. A bee will leave its stinger in the victim, but wasps take their stingers with them and can sting again. Even though you won’t get stung again by the same bee, they send out a scent that informs nearby bees that an attack is underway. This is especially true with Africanized bees, which are more aggressive than native bees. Wasps and hornets (also called Vespids) can also be persistent in their pursuit of the intruder (that’s you). As such, you should leave the area immediately whether the culprit was a bee, wasp or hornet.

22 foot long wasp nest found in abandoned building

The best way to reduce any reaction to bee venom is to remove the bee stinger as quickly as possible. Pull it out with tweezers or, if possible, scrape it out with your fingernail or sharp-edged object. The venom sac of a bee should not be manipulated as it will inject more irritant into the victim. The longer bee stingers are allowed to remain in the body, the higher chance for a severe reaction.

Most bee and wasp stings heal with little or no treatment. For those that experience only local reactions, the following actions will be sufficient:
Clean the area thoroughly.
Remove the stinger if visible.
Place cold packs and anesthetic ointments to relieve discomfort and local swelling.
Control itching and redness with oral antihistamines such as Benadryl or Claritin.
Give Acetaminophen or ibuprofen to reduce discomfort.
Apply antibiotic ointments to prevent infection.

Topical essential oils may be applied (after removing the stinger) with beneficial effect. Use Lavadin, helichrysum, tea tree or peppermint oil, applying 1 or 2 drops to the affected area, 3 times a day. A baking soda paste (baking soda mixed with a small amount of water) may be useful when applied to a sting wound.

Bee Stinger in place with inflammation
Although most of these injuries are relatively minor, there are quite a few people who are allergic to the toxins in the stings. Some are so allergic that they will have what is called an “anaphylactic reaction”. Instead of just local symptoms like rashes and itching, they will experience dizziness, difficulty breathing and/or faintness. Severe swelling is seen in some, which can be life-threatening if it closes the person’s airways.

Those experiencing an anaphylactic reaction will require treatment with epinephrine as well as antihistamines. People who are aware that they are highly allergic to stings should carry antihistamines and epinephrine on their person whenever they go outside.

Epinephrine is available in a pre-measured dose cartridge known as the Epi-Pen (there is a pediatric

version, as well). The Epi-pen is a prescription medication, but few doctors would begrudge a request for one. Make sure to make them aware that you will be outside and may be exposed to possible causes of anaphylaxis. As a matter of fact, it may be wise to have several Epi-Pens in your possession. See our articles on allergic reactions for a more in-depth discussion.

Water: Storage

As Practical Preppers’ Scott Hunt explains, storing water is probably the most important thing that a prepper can do—and it’s one of the easiest measures to take, as well. “Storage is the easiest part of the solution, and it’s easy for anybody to do, whether you live in downtown Manhattan or Idaho,” he says. Here are some basic tips.

• Figure Out How Much Water You Need to Store. Hunt says that you need about five gallons a day—one gallon for drinking, and another four gallons for bathing, personal hygiene and washing dishes. And while you can get away with using recycled or “grey” water for toilets, you need clean water that’s free of dangerous pathogens for everything else. That means you’ll need 50 gallons for each person in your household to make it through 10 days of a crisis, which gives you time to get your resupply system up and running.

• Find a Safe Place to Store Your Water. Remember that a gallon of water weighs about eight pounds, so you need to store it in a place that can support the added weight. You want to keep it in a cool, dry place, away from direct sunlight. That makes a basement probably the ideal place for your water storage. Because hydrocarbon vapors can penetrate plastic water containers, you want to keep your water supply away from gasoline, pesticides, kerosene, and similar substances.

• Set Up a Storage System.  Basic55-gallon plastic water drums go for around $60, but if you’ve got a larger group to provide for, you’ll save money by investing in one of the bigger models available from Internet prepper supply companies. You can get a 10,000 gallon plastic tank for around $5,500. There are even more expensive stainless steel water tanks, which manufacturers claim are more resistant to bacteria and mold growth, and less vulnerable to fire damage. On the downside, that chlorine from your municipal water can corrode steel, so you may want to look for a tank that’s specially lined to cope with that. Offthegridnews.com, a prepper website, provides a detailed guide to various container options.

• Make Sure Your Water Doesn’t Become Contaminated or Foul-Tasting.  Bottled water that has a seal showing it has been certified by theInternational Bottled Water Association or the National Sanitation Foundation generally has a shelf-life of one year. If you’re storing tap water or water from some other source, you probably should replace it every six months. To improve the taste of water stored for a long time, pour it from one clean container to another clean container several times, to put air back into it. If you’re concerned that a water supply may have become contaminated, the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service offers this handy guide to storing water, which includes instructions of simple disinfection methods.

• Know How to Get the Hidden Supply That’s in Your Pipes. To do this in the event of an emergency, Hunt says, you need to shut off the valve that connects your municipal water supply to your home. (The Federal Emergency Management Agency recommends that you do that first step immediately in the event of a disaster, to prevent contamination from non-functioning water purification plants from getting into your plumbing.) Then place a container under the lowest faucet in your system, and open it in the cold direction. After that, open a second faucet, which will allow air to enter the system. That’ll get all the cold water that’s been lingering in your plumbing.

• Know What Water Sources You Can’t Safely Use.  FEMA advises that radiators, hot water boilers, water beds, toilet bowls and tanks, and swimming pools and spas aren’t safe sources of potable water. Here’s FEMA’s guide to securing stored water and other necessities for emergencies.

If you only do three things:

• Get some two-liter plastic bottles and fill them up with tap water.  As James Wesley Rawles notes in his book How to Survive the End of the World As We Know It, Even the most cramped apartment dweller can store some small jugs under a bed.
• Learn how to get drain the water that remains in your pipes.  All you need to do is locate your water cutoff switch, and get some jugs or other containers to collect the water.
• Remember all the places and types of water that you can’t drink safely.  It’s tough being thirsty, but it’s even worse to be thirsty and sick.

Noah and the Ark

The Dangers of Dehydration

It is an understatement to say water is crucial to life. Water is life. You will die if you don’t drink water within two or three days.

Even cutting back causes distress. “Lack of water is always the most severe privation that men can be condemned to endure,” wrote Ernest Shackleton. The need is greater in hot climates, where the body loses water more rapidly through perspiration. Physical activity, altitude, stress, and illness or injury also hasten the loss of water and its need for replacement. But even sitting quietly in a shelter in Arctic cold, you must drink at least 2.3 liters—more than half a gallon—each day to replace the water you lose and to function efficiently.

If you lack water, conserve your energy. Don’t smoke or drink alcohol. In a hot climate, exert yourself only at night. Also try breathing through your nose and eating only a minimum. Without water, the human body rapidly deteriorates. Blood becomes thicker, making the heart work harder to pump it. Impaired circulation reduces the ability to shed excess heat in hot climates or retain heat in cold ones. As dehydration increases, the body pulls water from cells to keep blood flowing, which damages cell membranes and increases cellular salt concentrations.

Your biggest challenge may be finding water that’s clean enough to drink. Most of the Earth’s surface is covered with undrinkable saltwater, and most of the rest—stored in ponds, lakes, streams, and rivers—is contaminated with microorganisms and chemicals. You will need to develop water-purification skills to survive in the wild. But what if you have no means to purify water you collect in the wilderness? You may have to weigh your options. Going without water threatens life. So too may the illnesses caused by drinking impure water. You may decide to drink, and survive, in the short run and deal with any life-threatening illnesses later.

WATER BASICS
The standard recommendation is to figure one gallon of water per person per day for wilderness consumption. That’s also the amount recommended for storage for home emergencies. Desert conditions require more water. Each person venturing in the wild should carry as much water as is comfortable, along with a purifying device if no fresh water is available.

Carrying as much water as you need for extended trips is impossible. Besides being bulky, each gallon weighs about eight pounds, making the aggregate unwieldy. Thus, long-distance hikers as well as people in survival situations must know how to find, store, and purify water.

For short trips, water can be carried in a variety of containers. Metal vacuum flasks are almost unbreakable but can be heavy when filled. Plastic bottles are lightweight and tough but may melt if left too close to a fire.

Pouches clipped to the belt or worn on the back allow water to be easily accessed while keeping hands free.

Large plastic water bags can be hung from trees for use in a large camp. Water bladders such as polypropylene Platypus containers or CamelBaks (place in backpack, drink through tube) are nearly weightless and collapse flat when empty.

EFFECTS OF DEHYDRATION
Losing up to five percent of body fluids causes thirst, weakness, nausea, and irritability. Pulse increases, and skin may become flushed. Judgment may be seriously impaired even if the body loses only two percent of its fluids.

Losing up to ten percent causes headaches, dizziness, and tingling in limbs. Sufferers may lose the ability to walk and speak clearly. Skin may turn blue, and vision may begin to blur.

Loss of 15 percent severely impairs vision and hearing, swells the tongue, and makes urination painful. Sufferers may be unable to swallow, or may exhibit signs of delirium.

Loss of more than 15 percent usually causes death.

Many signs of dehydration match common physical symptoms of fear and panic. When the two are combined, they strike the body doubly hard.

HOW AND WHEN TO DRINK
It’s best to take small drinks at regular intervals, such as every hour, to prevent dehydration.

Look for obvious signs of dehydration in yourself and your companions: dark, sunken eyes; dark, smelly urine; fatigue; and shriveled skin. Begin drinking immediately.

The optimal drink for someone who already is dehydrated is plain water. Salts and minerals in sports drinks can interfere with the body’s absorption of water.

Don’t wait to become thirsty before you start drinking or looking for water. A noticeable thirst begins when the body is two percent dehydrated. It’s difficult to drink more than a quart of water at one time without experiencing discomfort; therefore, once serious dehydration begins, it may take hours to return your body to a healthy state.

Take Responsibility

President Benson - "I would highly recommend..."

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Home Soil Testing - No Need For A Soil Test Kit To Do This Soil Test

I know you probably want to learn about topics like:

• How to get rid of insect and disease pests, or
• How to grow the best-tasting tomatoes ever, or
• Which fertilizers to apply to improve your soil

And I can hardly wait to teach you these things.

But the thing is, we absolutely need to go over this home soil testing stuff first.

In fact, it may not seem like it yet, but I’m already starting to teach you that stuff, because if you can do this step that so many gardeners never bother to do...

...which is learn about your soil and get some good soil test results...

...aphids and Brandywines and soil imbalances will be so much easier to address.

In fact, within a few years, you’re going to be able to consistently grow big, nutrient-dense, pest-free yields of your favorite tomatoes or strawberries or garlic and basil for pesto or whatever you want to grow.

I say a few years because it does often take awhile to improve soil so as to get exceptionally healthy plants.

But not to worry, that doesn’t mean you won’t see excellent results this year, too.

Getting high quality vegetable harvests (or big bursts of flowers if that’s your thing) year after year can take some time, but growing food so tasty that it gives you goosebumps can most definitely happen in year one or two and will get better most every year after that.And it starts for me with this simple home soil testing.

We’ve looked at what soil is made of and how it’s formed, and now it’s time to look at your soil.

Eventually you might want to get into some more specific soil testing through one of the soil testing labs I recommend, and I’ll get into more detail in an upcoming lesson.

But even though I may bring out a little home soil test kit once in awhile just for kicks, I still start with some simpler tests I can do myself.

I enjoy this process so much that I do it every year or two in order to track my progress. I even keep a diary so I can remember where I started.

It’s very easy - takes me less than half an hour. The hardest part is walking out to the garden or lawn and digging a hole that’s about 1 cubic foot - 12 inches deep, long and wide.

Place that soil on a tarp or garbage bag, and then it’s time to play and observe and take notes.

• Is the soil easy to dig or is it like concrete?
• Is it a nice dark brown indicating good organic matter or a less-than-optimal beige, gray or blue indicating low organic matter and lack of air?
• Does it smell like rotten eggs indicating perhaps poor drainage, or a nice, earthy forest floor indicating a healthy soil food web?
• Does the ribbon test mentioned in the first lesson point to an especially sandy or clay soil that needs amending?
• Or does the soil you pulled out fall apart like beach sand, or does it stick together in huge clumps meaning it is probably heavy clay, again, either of which may need amending?
• If you dug in an area with roots, like a lawn, do they go nice and deep or do they stop short, indicating compaction or a hardpan layer in the soil that needs to be broken up?
• Are there different kinds of insects, and (in most regions) at least 10 earthworms, indicating the soil is a healthy place for them to live, or if not, indicating the soil needs help?

If you’ve skimmed these bullets quickly and are now going to go back to reading your email instead of digging a hole in your garden, I understand.

It is often much more fun to read about doing something than to get out of your chair and do it - I do that all the time.

Plus, it may be winter where you are.

So all I will say is just keep it in the back of your mind that the next time you are working in your organic garden, it might be a good idea to dig a hole and take a few notes on it.

Doing this home soil testing won’t solve the whole soil puzzle, but answering these questions does give you all kinds of information you can use.

Like if your soil needs a lot of compost or could use some tilling or double digging, how to water and fertilize, which plants to use, and so on.

Then you can move onto improving that soil and making a garden bed, and eventually into doing some more fancy pants soil testing at home, both of which we’ll get into in the coming lessons.

What’s your biggest question about how to improve your own soil? Ask me below and I'll get back to you...

Canning Homemade Dog Food – Recipe and Instructions!

By Stephanie Dayle - via The America Preppers Network

When I make dog food, I make it using one type of meat per batch.  So we'll make a batch of dog food using beef, and another for chicken parts (we save the less desirable parts from the chickens we butcher and turkeys we eat when we have enough of these random parts we grind them up and make a batch of dog food with them) but we don't combine them.  So when we came across some extra meat this fall we didn't want it to go to waste and made some dog food out of it.  It is fairly cost efficient and much more healthy than the stuff you by at the store.  As a nice side effect, it also boosts our stock of dog food we keep at the house in case of an emergency and if push comes to shove it's completely safe for humans to eat too.

After a successful hunting season, we took the parts of our deer that weren't used for steaks, sausage, or jerky and trimmed them up again.  This includes the liver and some other organ meats - we love to eat venison heart so the dogs didn't get that.  We cut all the tendon out, any bone, and any abnormally large chunks of fat.  Anything eatable that was cut out of the dog food was fed to the dogs in small amounts as snacks, treats, or mixed in with their regular food.  They even got the bone marrow from the bigger bones.  The ONLY thing that was thrown out on this deer, was the rib cage, spine, and lower intestinal tact, all devoid of meat - everything else was used.

Since I wanted to can this batch of Dog Food, it was important to not have too much fat in the recipe - I know the dogs need fat as part of their diet, but too much and you run the risk of it going rancid even when canned.  So we included some fat but not too much.  I just eye balled this, as we tossed the meat into a large stock pot with some water.  We cooked all the meat with water for just over an hour in a giant canning/dog food making session.  This created a "meat stock" we used later. The venison meat made roughly 20 quart sized jars of dog food.

I also cooked up some veggies. Carrots and spinach (the next time it will be carrots and green beans, I have heard green beans are a better fiber for moving things along in their intestinal track) it is just stuff we had from the garden so it was all grown at home.  I added those in for vitamins and minerals.  Then added some hard boiled eggs from my chickens WITH the shells for calcium.

I also cooked up some rice (overcook the rice with more water than is needed so it can't swell, if you are not planning on canning the dog food - please disregard this step) as this is usually very easy for dogs to process, and its dirt cheap.

Then we added some cider vinegar - to keep the acidity level up (this discourages bacteria growth when canned) and because I have read it is good for their joints.  Our older German Shepherd needs everything good for joints.  We also added a little bit of garlic - which in small amounts can improve palatability for the dogs and helps repeal insects.  I have heard garlic can be bad but after doing some reading on the subject and talking to my vet, I decided this small amount of garlic is harmless and may even be beneficial as there are people who say adding some garlic in their diet can help to discourage mosquitoes and ticks.

We mixed all that together.  Then we ran it all through a meat grinder - on medium - with a course grind blade.

Next we prepared the jars and pressure canner for canning.

We kept the ground up dog food warm - and then added back in some of the "meat stock" which was also being kept warm on the stove . This is what is commonly known as a hot pack in the world of canning. In retrospect - we found out the hard way, that too much liquid causes the seals to fail. So all the jars we've done since then have been a tad more on the dry side.

Leaving just about 2 inches of headspace in the jars, we filled them and processed them in our pressure canner at 10 lbs for 90 minutes following the recommendation in our canning book for 'ground beef'. Don't forget to adjust for your altitude!  If I had been canning 'pint jars' instead of 'quart jars' it would've been for 75 minutes.  UPDATE: Due to what I have learned on canning safety I have switched to canning this recipe at 15 lbs for the entire 90 minutes, this adds a little bit more insurance for me that I am doing everything I can to produce a safe end product.  I love hearing that ping of a successfully sealed jar!

The finished product.

And just in case you are wondering homemade dog food doesn't stink.  In fact it smells like a roast cooking in the oven.  It will make you hungry. Our dogs LOVE it - whenever we feed it every dish is licked perfectly clean when they are done.  We don't prep this dog food exclusively but we do make it when we have scrap meat like I mentioned above and add it into a rotation.  It helps me know that I am doing everything I can as a responsible pet owner to provide for them in the event of a disaster.

Pet Food-What to Store and How" is another article I have written for American Preppers Network that also addresses all types of store bought dog and cat food, if making your own is not your thing.  I have covered how to store it to get the maximum amount of storage life out of it, techniques for usage, and even some new ideas for food - like freeze-dried dog food. Click Here!

Here is the recipe - I got the original one from The Canning Granny Blog  (a wonderful blog for all things 'canning and preserving' plus she's a Washington native and just a neat lady!) and made a few modifications due to my preference for a higher meat ratio and needing less liquid.

This will do a single batch of 6 or so pint jars.

• 3.5 Cups of Meat
• 2 Cups of Rice
• 2-3 Large Cooked Carrots
• Half a bag of Cooked Spinach or a Handful of Cooked Green Beans
• One Boiled Egg still in the shell
• 2-3 TBS of Cider Vinegar
• 1 TBS of Garlic Powder
• 1 Cup of "Meat Stock"

If you want to forgo the pressure canning  you can partition out serving sizes, stick them into little freezer bags or FoodSaver bags, vacuum them and then freeze them. This recipe would even make good RAW meals for your dog if you aren't canning it. Each morning simply get a bag of food out and it will be thawed and ready to serve in the evening. No wheat, no corn, no preservatives, or other goofy crap that Dog Food companies like to add.

According to The Canning Granny, one pint of this dog food will feed a 100lb dog for a day, fed half in the morning and half in the evening.  Of course, this will vary from dog to dog as they have different energy needs so like any dog food you will have to keep an eye on your dogs weight.

I would also like to add that I understand that USDA advises against canning rice.  They recommend this because rice swells, it also increases the density in the jar making it more difficult to come up to temperature.  Also this recipe is has not been scientifically tested for safety, so you are taking a great risk by using it.  But I do know this, and now so do you .  I choose to can it anyways.  You will have to decide for yourself if you want to can with rice and with this unapproved recipe. One more thing you can do make the recipe safer is to use pint jars instead of quart jars.

Finding Water with None in Sight

You’re out hiking when you come across a neat looking trail. You follow it for a while, taking pictures, when you realize the trail is gone and you do not know where you are. It is getting hot outside and you are really thirsty. Your short hike has now turned into a survival situation. This scenario plays out frequently in National Parks and trails all over the country.

There are numerous ways to find and collect water in a survival situation. When in survival mode, you want to do as little as possible to preserve fluids and energy. Transpiration is a very easy method which requires minimal materials and minimal effort.

What is Transpiration? Transpiration, in generic terms, is when plants ‘sweat’ the moisture inside them. Theamount of water shed will depend on heat, humidity, sunlight and the amount of water inside the plant. The way that we can harness is this wonderful and natural occurrence is with the use of a plastic bag…and the rays of that burning mass of gas called the ‘Sun’. Here are the steps:

1. Find a tree or bush with as many green leaves possible. Avoid plants like poison oak, etc
2. Use a plastic bag you find or one you brought with you, because your prepared, and place it around a big bunch of leaves.
3. Bundle up the open end of the bag against the main branch and tie off with rope, shoestring or whatever you have available.
4. If the bag is not naturally hanging low, tie a string to the branch and tie it to something low to the ground. This will allow the water collecting to pool in a corner of the bag.
5. Allow the bag to be exposed to as much sunlight as possible. This will heat up the plastic bag, the plants will ‘sweat’, and the water will condense on the inside of the bag and eventually drip and collect in the corner.
6. Enjoy clean fresh drinkable water that needs no filtration or purification!