Joan Crain
I am impressed with the body of knowledge that is flowing, seemingly effortlessly, from Self Reliance Works and am happy to be a contributing member. I am very sure I will be learning more than I contribute.
Even though I have been a city dweller my entire life, I was brought up by parents who knew and taught us the value of self reliance, frugal living, and how to have a do-it-yourself outlook. My Father could fix anything, build anything, and just make things work.
My growing up years were spent on a ½ acre plot of land where my parents built our house and planted apple, pear, cherry, peach and plum trees, a large raspberry patch, and a garden with a variety of vegetables. We had a large freezer which my Mother filled with home-baked bread, pies, cakes, cookies, and vegetables. Under the laundry room, via a trap door, was our cellar filled with home-canned fruit and bottles of various jams and jellies.
She also sewed most of our clothes on her old treadle sewing machine.
We were poor by my parent’s standards, but I never noticed. We always had something to eat, clothes to wear, and lots of love. Because of this upbringing, frugal living was deeply rooted in me and I carried it into my adult life.
My (2nd) husband of 13 years is of the same mind. His dowry to our marriage was buckets of wheat and cans of food, which gave us a pretty good start on our food storage program. We are well matched on many subjects, such as personal choice, free enterprise and self-employment (for me), limited government intrusion, frugal living, saving money, living within our income, recycling, and getting and staying out of debt. We’ve come a long way on getting out of debt, paying off more than $40,000 in 6 years. We are both fully committed to saving as much money as possible. Having a “rainy day fund” has saved us from going into debt several times because of layoffs and medical procedures.
Having been born and raised in Utah, and lived here most of my life, you might guess that I have been strongly influenced by the Mormon practice of food storage and having a two-year supply at all times. That would be a correct guess. It is a pleasure to live among a people whose industriousness permeates all aspects of life, which is why the state symbol is a beehive. People in Utah have a strong can-do, self-reliant, do-it-yourself attitude.
I hope that my posts and my Family Survival Planning web site, about food storage and preparing for any disaster or crisis will inspire others to prepare physically, emotionally and materially for whatever life hands us – because it will and it does – usually with no warnings.
