neat article on ky. storm and amish

[whiting-5]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29019426/

maybe were not so self sufficent. but i like the part about the nice toasty house with wood burner .now if i can just get a milk cow and a wife that will cook some good old fashion meals i bet you them amish girls dont think that home cookin is 3 minutes on high

 

[wigglesworth]

That is what Im talking about!! Self preservation at its best.

 

[Steve NW WI]

Neat deal. I'm not as prepared as some if I were in a situation like that, but with a woodstove in the basement, gas cookstove, and a bunch of canned food, I'm sure it wouldn't hurt me too bad - but I might have to find a generator so I could read all this stuff!

 

[avalancher]

Good story, thanks for the post!
Makes a guy almost with he was Amish sometimes....

 

[A. Stanton]

Interesting article; thanks for sharing, Whit.

 

[660grizzman]

It's nice to see neighbor helping neighbor instead of the looting that typically happens when a natural disaster occurs in other parts of the country.

 

[bigjake]

You know i kinda look at this like katrina only the difference is the media dosent
care about people that take care of each other.This is a big disaster but
most people dont even know about it.

Its sad that people that have been on welfare there whole life depend on
the goverment for everything but air.This whole group on here would do
better than 95 % of the people.

 

[Zodiac45]

Good story, thanks for the post!
Makes a guy almost with he was Amish sometimes....

Yep almost, until you start using that 372XP as a bucksaw!

I like the fact of living off the grid for sure. (Wish I had the dough for a wind turbine.) I do grow a good sized garden and really live out of it in the spring-fall. I give allot too my family and sell down too the Farmers Market on Sat's during the season. Many people had "Victory Gardens" during the WWII when things were in short supply. I think it's excellent skill set too pass onto your kids. The way things are headed, it may come in very handy in the future. Husbandry (raising animals) gardening, putting surplus by (canning), wood gathering, splitting and seasoning and any other self sufficient skills will be making a comeback. No doubt. The scare tactics aside, it's a great feeling too see (and taste) your labor's fruits (and meats and vegetables)

 

[woodbooga]

One of life's simple joys is reading next to the woodstove. Or playing hotwheels with the little guy in the mud.

Another (to everything there is a season) is plopping my butt in the middle of a mid-August cherry tomato patch and just snacking away. Or bringing the salt cellar out to the cucumber vines and helping myself.

Interesting (I think) aside: when I was at UNH, I was friends with a lot of the international students. One of them was from Romania. Pronounced cucumber as kah-KUM-ber. I really do try not to be too dopey with folks from other parts of the world, but it made me really laugh. Literally lol.

 

[strongback]

The Amish are great examples of real survivalist; as opposed to the mall ninjas we usually see featured. Aside from the obvious benefit of not having a cold hungry family, it also serves to free up gubmint and NGO services for others and allows the prepared, like the Amish in the article, to provide help to those who need it.

My minimum standard, is survival at our current standard (provided we remain in our current shelter) for at least one month, completely independant of the outside world. If we have to Get out of Dodge, I'm prepared to do that for a month as well but there will obviously have to be adjustments in consumption of certain things.

I'll go a step further and say that if you aren't prepared to weather a disaster/emergency of at least a few weeks, then your aren't doing your job as head (or vice-head as the case may be) of your family.

 

[whiting-5]

You know i kinda look at this like katrina only the difference is the media dosent
care about people that take care of each other.This is a big disaster but
most people dont even know about it.

Its sad that people that have been on welfare there whole life depend on
the goverment for everything but air.This whole group on here would do
better than 95 % of the people.

its funny my wife and i were just talking about this at lunch today. there were people up and down the coast that had lost everything in the storm but were able to fish for there meals and pretty much survive and not be all freaked out stay in control of there lives. there is no way i would have taken my family to the stadium and put up with that nonsense.

we have lived in tn for three years now we were both born and raised in las vegas never lived in the country before but i was raised off and on by both sets of grandparents depression era folks and had survival pounded into my head.
im glad they did we have 18 acres got my pasture 2 acres done last year in just a little while 2 black angus will be going in there.
have another area where i will raise some pigs. will fill the frezzer this fall. and not worry about the prices of meat.

the garden i dont know!!! every time i buy a plant it comes over the loud speaker
(dead plant walking) and they seem very time consuming with my adult ADD i dont know if i could stay focused...

 

[Zodiac45]

its funny my wife and i were just talking about this at lunch today. there were people up and down the coast that had lost everything in the storm but were able to fish for there meals and pretty much survive and not be all freaked out stay in control of there lives. there is no way i would have taken my family to the stadium and put up with that nonsense.

we have lived in tn for three years now we were both born and raised in las vegas never lived in the country before but i was raised off and on by both sets of grandparents depression era folks and had survival pounded into my head.
im glad they did we have 18 acres got my pasture 2 acres done last year in just a little while 2 black angus will be going in there.
have another area where i will raise some pigs. will fill the frezzer this fall. and not worry about the prices of meat.

the garden i dont know!!! every time i buy a plant it comes over the loud speaker
(dead plant walking) and they seem very time consuming with my adult ADD i dont know if i could stay focused...

Ha,ha, good post Whiting. You're selling yourself short though. Gardening, if done with a plan and a little advance study is pretty easy. Everyone tells me I have a green thumb but honestly when I was a youngster, I hung out with my Grandpa (Nono) who was an Italian immigrant. Part of my chores was too hang with him and help with the veg garden. I now remember this fondly as some of the best time and lessons of my life. We treated the garden not so much as work, but more like a privilege that gave in accordance too what you put into it. Since those days there have allot of improvements and technique in home vegetable gardening. Things like raised bed and "square foot" gardening allow one too get great yields even out of small areas. Well worth the effort the vary first time you taste a home grown organic tomato versus a store bought! Really any veg you grow will kick butt on anything the supermarket can put out!

 

[Dalmatian90]

the garden i dont know!!! every time i buy a plant it comes over the loud speaker (dead plant walking) and they seem very time consuming with my adult ADD i dont know if i could stay focused...

I don't think it's so much they take a lot of time, instead it's a slow learning process.

About 10 years into my garden and having things down to a system (plus the more limited experience growing up and at my sister's), I reckon I can easily grow 1000#/year for about 4 hours a week of time. Still keep a journal and checking my notes from past years to make sure I remember what works and don't do what didn't work out so well again.

 

[danrclem]

(quote)He is a member of the Old Order Amish, a sect that shuns modern conveniences such as radios and televisions.(quote)

I don't know what the percentage is but I can tell you that not all of the Amish people in Ky. live without modern conveniences. I have seen some driving fancy pickup trucks and use the same tools that everybody else uses.

I do admire the Amish that live their lives like it was over 100 years ago. I like their way of life and wouldn't mind leaning that way myself.

I would like to have enough solar panels and batteries to run my whole system but the cost would be very high. It might be worth it in the long run though. I've thought about a windmill but my state supposedly doesn't have enough air flow to power them sufficiently.

 

[Dalmatian90]

I should've posted this before:

http://amishamerica.typepad.com/amish_america/

That's a fascinating blog I check a couple times a month. Recently there's been some long Q&A posts to read through, so if your a first time reader going back to some of the old, smaller posts may give you more bang for the buck.

Anyway, the Amish are a very diverse group in their exact practices.

Some pretty fascinating things I've learned from the blog -- their leaders (Bishops) are chosen by the combination of secret nominations, then from the nominees the Bishop is selected at random ("Hand of God"). I wonder how many other boards would do better chosen that way!

Anyway, if you want to learn about the Amish, it's a great sight to look through for a while.

 

[streeter]

Anyway, the Amish are a very diverse group in their exact practices.

The Amish I have met are very nice people and there diversity among the different groups is vast. My mother and brother visit a general store run by amish. My mother loves them!! There is one gal there that just goes giggley when my brother goes in. Another group does awesome wood work, they bought and awsome hand crafted oak dinner table off them.

They are nice people and deserve our respect (they have mine).

 

[rx7145]

Good story, thanks for the post!
Makes a guy almost with he was Amish sometimes....

Not me!!

I feel bad for the Amish girls. They work so hard and It's very hard for them to "get out".

 

[StihltheOne]

As I read this post, I just think about what happened here about 10 days ago, we were -30f, it was about 1 ish in the am, I was up loading the stove again, and making sure I did not hear any running water etc.. and then the power went out. I kinda cursed a little and waited.... I put on my coat and went to the shop, loaded the fire there too, grabbed my generator, and a cord, hauled around the back, it was serviced a full of fuel, fired it up ran the cord in, plugged in the fans behind the wood stove and camped out on the couch. I had a bit of pride rolling around in my head as I drifted off to sleep. I bet we were not without heat 15 min. I woke up once or twice to reaload the fire, and at 6:15 the power came on, I shut off the gen, took a shower and woke up my wife, she had no clue anything had happened. I thought to myself, well done and to think I was actually able to do that without bailout money or the gubment getting involved. No big deal. Just doing what everone on this site would do. Taking care of business.

 

[thejdman04]

Good post

 

[arlen]

My wife cooks.

Thanks nice article.

My wife spends hours cooking most every day, that makes me pretty dam lucky.

I admire the Amish for there simple way of life and self sufficiency.

David