9 Excuses I hear ALL THE TIME regarding starting a PANTRY....and my answers to them...

Good morning to you!

I wanted to quickly address something 
that I am constantly getting emails about.

As many of you know from reading this blog for a period of time, I am ALL about being as self-sufficient as you can be. If that means gardening, then do it. If that means learning to raise and butcher your own meat, then do it. If that means learning to do things around your house, or garden, or yard, or car, or whatever else so you are able to take care of your own things, then I am all about it.

And it never ceases to amaze me the excuses people will come up with to  convince themselves that they should never even try.

Here are the top nine that I hear one variation of or another throughout each month.

I don't have enough money.

I live in an apartment.

I am disabled.

I don't like to grocery shop.

I would have to get rid of some of my shoes/clothes/stuff/storage stuff to store food. 
(yes, this is one)

My family doesn't support me.

My friends think I am crazy.

I have no idea where to start.

My kids keep me too busy to make meal plans.

Listen, please, from my heart to yours.

I can come up with a million more excuses than those in about ten minutes, mainly because I am creative, but also because I have walked a mile in the shoes of each one of those excuses.

However, seriously, you need to begin to equip yourself. All the things I teach about one time or another, were completely commonplace.

People knew how to do them.

They knew how to look at whatever their situation was and work with it.

Listen to how I would, and have, answered those questions.

If you don't have enough money, use what you do have to make a start, and learn to barter. If you dont have something to barter, then learn a skill and start somewhere. Find people who need the information, or skill that you develop and trade what you have for what they have.

If you live in an apartment, take advantage of sales if you can not garden, and dehydrate things. Learn to can and preserve the sales and build up a stock of food. Just because you live in an apartment does NOT mean that you can not learn how to change a leaky faucet, fix a broken window, or even dabble in growing greens with a grow light for better nutrition. Work with what you have, and find a way to make the best of it.

Dear friend who is disabled. As my dear, sweet mother would say...you are only as disabled as you think you are. You know your limits, and you set them, they do not determine who you are or what you are capable of. Find what those limits and capabilities are, and work around them. You can not stand for any length of time? Then use a food processor and dehydrator and store up food. Buy online when you see sales. Find a friend who can help and grow for you if you are not able to keep a garden on your own. Consider container gardening that is at a higher level and completely contained. If you have family, jump in and help them if you can get them on board, and split the results of your combined labor. That is how we make it work in this family, and we know many others in similar places.

I don't like to grocery shop either, so we can commiserate together. However, I have never let the things I dont like to do define what I accomplish in my life. I may not like to eat brussell sprouts either, but that does not stop me from growing them for my husband and daughter, who adore them. CHOOSE to be determined, choose to meal plan so you can write a detailed list, and be in and out of that grocery store. Or order online where they deliver it right to your door. Your choice.

Dear friend who has too many shoes and is choosing to save her shoes versus building a small stock up of food. When you get hungry, just try chewing on one for a few minutes and see if that changes your mind on what is important, and what is not. Life is all about choices between essentials, and non-essentials. Make sure you are focused on the right things, and everything else will begin to fall into place. IN other words, get rid of the shoes, and get some food in your house. You will thank me later.

You know what, if your family does not support you, you have to do what you can. Are you the grocery shopper? The bill payer? The head cook? Then guess what? You have power at your fingertips to do what is necessary to make little changes that lead to big changes. Start small, be gracious when faced with adversity, and take steps to become more prepared than you have been in the past. Americans are most certainly food-rich when compared to most other countries, and most families have cupboards filled with foods that they pull from over the weeks or months. Slowly add to it. Start with cheap and filling, and begin to add from there. And know that there are many others who have had to go it alone in the face of scoffing family members, or less-than-thrilled spouses.

If your friends think you are crazy, take it from me, it is time to find new friends. Everyone is pretty darn nervous these days with our economic situation, and you being willing to stand up for what you believe may lead you into a whole new awesome friendship with those friends. Otherwise, a word of caution, if those friends are not on board, keep a little more quiet about what you are doing in building a food pantry, because guess who they are going to come visit if it just so happens that they are hungry and dont know where to get a free meal? No one needs those kind of friends.
Be careful who you share with. 

There are so SO many articles out on the Net about how to get started building a food pantry full of food storage for one person or an entire family. I plan on covering this tomorrow with a whole list of links for you. So please, hang on and this next series is just for you. However, if you have absolutely nothing in your home today, then take my word and go buy some rice, flour, dried beans, and canned fruit and veggies right now in case things get really bad really quickly later this month economically. If you have not heard of what happened when there was a glitch in the EBT card system earlier this week in 17 states, and how people panicked, then you need to look it up. And learn from it. Better to have a little food in your house, than be having to face a crowd like that to get enough to survive on.

And dear sweet friend who is using her kids as an excuse NOT to meal plan, or start stocking up a food pantry........pshaw. If I can do it with two of the craziest, wildest balls of energy disguised as 3 year -old twins, teach piano, teach school, run this blog, and my home and garden, can, preserve, etc etc etc

YOU CAN DO IT TOO.

So toss that sordid excuse out the window and get some gumption. Those kids depend on you.

And that is all I have to say about all of that.

I am waiting for the wonderful person who comes to me with the excuse that the purple unicorn that lives in her bedroom told her not to do it, because I just might have to write a whole post
on how to respond to that one.

What are some of the excuses you have dealt with personally in your own life that stop you from being more self-sufficient or ignore important steps of being prepared for disasters in your family?

I would love to hear them, because hopefully I can help you and encourage you through them. And please, know I am not knocking anyone, because I have walked through all of those at one time or another. You do the best you can with what you have, and refuse to listen to all the voices, or friends, or family telling you that you just cant do it. :)

Blessings to you and yours, 

~Heather