Out With The Old…
The beginning of March is our family’s Annual Rotation (okay, this is the first annual rotation – but it will be this time each year, probably). This is when we go through all our preps and rotate, replace, and update as needed. We decided on March because it’s a relatively slow time of year, there aren’t any holidays (or birthdays) that require extra money, gardens haven’t gone in yet, and maybe there’s even a tax return to help add a couple of new prep items that we’ve wanted.
Here’s our Annual Rotation list to rotate, replace, update, and/or review:
BOB** food: We don’t rotate MREs or freeze-dried stuff every year, but peanut butter, power bars, tuna, snacks, etc. all get replaced with new. The old goes to (the front of) our pantry.- Batteries: in BOB, car and house flashlights, and smoke alarms and CO2 detectors
- Evacuation/Bug-Out Documentation: Check phone numbers, maps, and routes. Review plan with family. New photos of kids. Ensure ALL copies of evacuation documentation get updated.
- EDC wallet contact card
- Short List (a check-list of items we’d quickly grab if we had to bug-out with little notice – more about Short Lists on Wednesday*)
- Red Buckets (non-perishable food in red 5-gallon buckets, with orange gamma lids, pre-stocked to be quickly grabbed to supplement BOBs, also part of our Short List)
- Flash drives in BOBs with home video inventory and PDF resources
- SWYE: ensure inventory is accurate
In addition we do our quarterly review of stuff at this time:
- Generator: run briefly to test
- Extra car keys: check to make sure key in hidden magnetic box is still there
- Furnace filter: replace (not a prepper thing, but needs to be done regularly)
Think of any other things you keep in your preps, but don’t use very regularly, such as:
- Chainsaw (or other small gasoline powered tools): clean, inspect, and run briefly to test
- Firearms: ensure cleaned and oiled
- Firearm’s magazines: it’s a good idea to keep about half of your primary magazines loaded (to about 80% capacity); then each year change over and use the other half (this will help maximize the follower spring’s life)
One thing that isn’t listed above, is our backup gasoline. Gasoline, with stabilizers, can last one to two years. We stagger ours so it doesn’t all have to be rotated at the same time (keep accurate records).
If you’re like us, you’re busy and life is hectic. We tend to forget about our faithful preps that just sit, waiting, in case we need them. And yes, it’s a hassle to replace and update things – but you’re doing this because you believe it’s important and necessary, remember? So make your own list(s), track the age of the perishable items, and rotate to keep your preps fresh and ready. (Minor confession: we’re not done with all of this yet, but we’re working on it…)
(Wednesday: *Quick, Grab Everything Important!)
**For my list of abbreviations and other information, open the above ‘Check Here…’ page tab.
I have a question on your video documentation of your home. I have wanted to make a home inventory so we can prove to insurance companies our loss of property via disaster or theft is legit. I never thought of doing one as a video. Do you have a post on how you accomplished this task? Is it as simple as walking around and describing items as you go? Maybe a how to for creating video documentation of your home could be a future post?
No, I don’t have a post about it yet. Yes, it would be a good idea for a future post – I’ll add that to my list (thanks). It basically is that simple, I walked through each room, narrating as I went. We also included pictures of all our valuables, and a list of serial numbers on the flash drives (1 8GB in each vehicle).
Good idea to stress the rotation. This is why so many of us have jars of peanut butter with expiration dates 4 years ago. We forget to rotate. For me, this is because I have not worked out a good place to rotate. I’m going to build a can rotation shelf, but I’m not quite there yet.
One thing to keep in mind, this time of year, many of us have tax refunds coming. What better way to use them than to add to our preps?
Rotating is a pain in the butt, both the SWYE and annually, but is important to have reliable preps and avoid waste. I looked into the Shelf Reliance storage systems, and while they’re very cool, they’re also pricey. When I get my homestead I’ll definitely build some myself.
Yep, tax returns and adding to preps go well. We’re continuing to pay down our debt with most (but we can see the light at the end of the tunnel). But set some aside for preps to add some more antibiotics, build a greenhouse, and build a rabbit hutch (and starting raising rabbits).
We have a Harvest 72 Shelf Reliance and we absolutely love it. We are much more organizationally challenged than Trace is, so for us, it is what allows us to store/rotate food on a larger scale than a few cans of each thing. For us it was definitely worth the price.
The Harvest 72s are so cool. That will definitely be something we get one day. Organization is so important in prepping – otherwise you buy the stuff, can’t find it/don’t use it and it just goes bad. Glad you found a system that works.