Daily Survival

Tuesday, May 12, 2026

Norovirus: What Is It?

Norovirus: What is it? If your stomach has ever suddenly turned on you, leaving you hunched over a trash can with no warning, there is a good chance norovirus was the culprit. It’s one of the most common illnesses in the world, yet many people have never heard its name. Understanding what it is, how it spreads, and how to keep your household safe can make a real difference, especially during the winter months when outbreaks peak. Oximeter (pulse oxygen monitor)

When I Got the Norovirus

This post is for general informational purposes only and doesn’t replace professional medical advice. If you have concerns about your health or a family member’s symptoms, consult a licensed healthcare provider. Please note, I’m not a doctor, nurse, or someone in the medical field. I got the Norovirus back in April 2024. I had all of the symptoms listed below. It came on so fast, I didn’t know what hit me. Some family members had some of the symptoms but hadn’t told Mark and me. They assumed they may have eaten some “bad food”.

On April 12, 2024, I started having trouble catching my breath and told Mark to take me to the ER immediately. I’m sure I was very dehydrated, but this is when it was discovered I needed oxygen after being sent by ambulance to a regular hospital. I thought I had the “flu.” Then all the medical personnel started wearing hazmat-looking outfits. I asked, “What’s with the door sign that says ‘Do Not Enter Without Protective Gear?” No one told me what I had, so I finally asked the young girl drawing my labs why everyone was dressed in these blue outfits.

I was hooked up to oxygen and never told why. We all need an advocate with you when you go to the hospital. I was there 3 days and never saw a doctor. The nurses showed us how to turn the beeping buttons on and off.

Hospital Discharge Time

The next thing I know, I have a case worker checking me out of the hospital. She asked why my oxygen was turned off. I was wearing an oxygen tube in my nose. I said I didn’t know it was turned off. She said your oxygen level is 84 and that you need oxygen. My daughter called the hospital from California and said, “You are not sending my mom home without oxygen.” The caseworker took notes, and oxygen was delivered to my home before I got there. Of course, I drove home attached to oxygen. I’ll never be off oxygen living at this altitude. It’s not fun. I’ve never smoked or vaped. Life changed for me big time. But I’m glad I have a great husband who helps me with everything. Although it’s frustrating to use the oxygen, who knows when I would have found out it was necessary if I hadn’t sought treatment for the norovirus?

What Exactly is Norovirus?

Norovirus is a highly contagious virus that causes sudden inflammation of the stomach and intestines, a condition doctors call gastroenteritis, though most families simply call it the stomach flu. Despite that nickname, norovirus is not related to influenza at all. It belongs to its own viral family and is responsible for roughly 685 million cases of illness worldwide each year, making it the leading cause of foodborne illness.

The virus is extraordinarily resilient. It can survive on surfaces for days, withstand many hand sanitizers, and even linger in lightly treated water. A person can become infected by swallowing as few as 18 viral particles, a dose too small to see, smell, or taste.

Note: Norovirus is not the stomach flu. Influenza is a respiratory illness. Norovirus is a gastrointestinal illness caused by a completely different virus.

What Are the Symptoms?

Norovirus symptoms come on fast, often within 12 to 48 hours of exposure, and can feel overwhelming at first. The good news is that most healthy people recover completely within one to three days. Here is what to watch for:

Nausea that comes on suddenly
Vomiting, often repeated
Watery diarrhea
Low-grade fever
Stomach cramping
Fatigue and body aches
Headache
Loss of appetite

Dehydration is the most serious concern, particularly for young children, older adults, and people with weakened immune systems. Watch for signs like dry mouth, dizziness, dark urine, or a child crying without tears. If dehydration becomes severe, medical care may be needed.

Keep this product stocked: LMNT, Liquid IV, or Sugar-Free Liquid IV.

How Does Norovirus Spread?

Norovirus travels in several ways, and all of them are remarkably easy to encounter in everyday life. Understanding each route helps you interrupt it before it reaches your family.

Person-to-person contact is the most common route. When an infected person uses the bathroom and then touches shared surfaces like door handles, light switches, or faucet knobs, the virus can transfer to the next person who touches those surfaces and then touches their mouth, nose, or eyes. Caring for a sick child or family member puts you at heightened risk.

Contaminated food and water are also major culprits. Raw or undercooked shellfish, particularly oysters, are a well-known source because they filter large volumes of water and can concentrate viruses. Leafy greens, fruits, and other ready-to-eat foods can be contaminated if an infected food handler touches them. Buffet-style settings, cruise ships, and shared kitchens are environments where outbreaks often occur.

Airborne particles play a surprising role as well. When an infected person vomits, tiny droplets carrying the virus can travel several feet, landing on surfaces or being inhaled. This is one reason norovirus spreads so rapidly in enclosed spaces like schools, nursing homes, and cruise ships.

How To Keep Your Family from Getting Norovirus

There’s no vaccine for norovirus, but consistent, everyday habits can dramatically lower your family’s chances of getting sick. The following steps are practical, family-friendly, and backed by public health guidance.

Wash your hands with soap and water

Hand sanitizer alone is not enough. Norovirus resists alcohol-based sanitizers. Scrub with soap for at least 20 seconds, especially after using the bathroom, changing diapers, and before preparing or eating food.

Rinse fruits and vegetables thoroughly

Wash all produce under running water before eating or cooking, even items with a peel you’ll remove. Cook shellfish like oysters to an internal temperature of at least 145 degrees Fahrenheit (63 degrees Celsius).

Disinfect surfaces the right way

Use a bleach-based household cleaner or a product labeled as effective against norovirus. Wipe down high-touch surfaces like toilet handles, faucets, and counters, especially when someone in the home is sick.

Wash contaminated laundry immediately

Handle soiled clothing and bedding carefully, avoid shaking them, and wash on the longest, hottest cycle available. Dry completely before reuse.

Stay home when sick

Anyone with norovirus symptoms should stay home from work, school, and shared spaces until at least 48 hours after symptoms have fully resolved. The virus sheds in high quantities even after a person starts to feel better.

Keep everyone well hydrated

If illness does strike, focus on fluids. Oral rehydration solutions work well for children. Water, clear broth, and sports drinks can help adults replace lost fluids and electrolytes. Avoid sugary or caffeinated beverages.

When Should You Call The Doctor?

Most norovirus cases resolve on their own without medical treatment. However, call a doctor or seek urgent care if a child under one year old is vomiting, if anyone can’t keep liquids down for more than 24 hours, if there are signs of severe dehydration, if there is blood in the stool, or if symptoms last longer than three days without improvement.

Older adults and people with chronic health conditions should have a lower threshold for seeking medical advice, as dehydration can become dangerous more quickly for them.

The Takeaway

Norovirus is unpleasant, fast-moving, and very easy to catch, but it’s also very preventable with the right habits. Thorough and frequent handwashing is the single most effective thing your family can do. Pair that with careful food handling, proper disinfection, and keeping sick family members at home, and you give norovirus very little room to take hold. When illness does strike, keep fluids flowing and rest up. For most healthy people, the worst is over within a couple of days.

Hantavirus: What Is It?

15 Essential Items For Your Hospital To-Go Bag

How To Tell If Your Child May Be Dehydrated

Final Word

Norovirus doesn’t discriminate. It finds its way into the cleanest homes, the best-run restaurants, and the most well-meaning families. Getting sick isn’t a sign that you did something wrong. What matters most is knowing what to look for, acting quickly when symptoms appear, and building a few simple habits that make it much harder for the virus to take hold.

Wash your hands well and often. Keep sick family members comfortable and hydrated. Give your home a thorough wipe-down when illness passes through. These are small steps, but they carry real weight.

The best time to prepare for norovirus is before it arrives. Now that you know what it is, how it travels, and how to stop it, you are already ahead of it affecting your family. May God bless this world, Linda

Copy Images: Norovirus Blood Test AdobeStock_191521166 By jarun011, Norovirus Lab Test With A GlovesAdobeStock_433224455 By luchschenF

The post Norovirus: What Is It? appeared first on Food Storage Moms.

from Food Storage Moms

How Do Chores Teach Life Skills? The Answer Every Prepper Parent Needs to Hear

Most parents give kids chores because the house needs to be clean. Prepper parents give kids chores because the world can fall apart, and a child who has never done hard work is a child who is not ready for it. The question of how do chores teach life skills has a simple answer: they do it by forcing kids to engage with real tasks, real consequences, and real effort. No simulation. No safety net. Just work that needs to get done.

From a preparedness standpoint, every chore your child completes is a building block toward competence. Self-reliance is not a personality trait. It is a collection of practiced skills. Chores are how you practice them.

Chores Build Functional Competence, Not Just Habits

There is a significant difference between a child who has been told how to do something and one who has actually done it under pressure. Washing dishes, hauling firewood, tending a garden, or cooking a simple meal are not busywork. They are core survival competencies dressed in everyday clothing.

When a child learns to cook by actually cooking, they develop knife handling, fire awareness, timing, and improvisation. When they haul and stack wood, they build physical endurance, spatial reasoning, and an understanding of how energy is produced and stored. These are not abstract lessons. They are the kind of know-how that keeps people alive when systems fail.

A child who has spent years doing meaningful household work is not going to freeze when the grid goes down. They already know how to work without convenience.

Discipline and Accountability Are Survival Traits

Prepping is a discipline game. You cannot stockpile food, maintain equipment, or execute a bug-out plan without personal accountability. Chores are the first training ground for both.

When a child is assigned a task and is expected to complete it, every day, without being reminded, they are building the internal structure that discipline requires. They learn that some things have to happen regardless of how they feel. The chickens need feeding whether it is raining or not. The water supply needs checking whether they slept well or not.

This daily repetition also teaches consequence. A garden that is not watered dies. A fire that is not tended goes out. Kids who are shielded from these outcomes grow into adults who have no instinct for proactive maintenance, which is one of the most dangerous gaps a prepper family can have.

Problem-Solving Under Real Conditions

Chores break. Equipment fails. The mop head falls off. The kindling is wet. The recipe is missing an ingredient. What happens in those moments matters far more than the task itself.

Research in child development shows that children who engage in practical household problem-solving develop stronger executive function than those who are sheltered from challenges. For preppers, executive function is another way of saying the ability to stay calm, assess options, and act. It is what separates people who adapt from people who collapse.

Do not fix the problem for your child every time something goes sideways during a chore. Let them figure it out. Ask them what they think should happen next. That friction is where the real skill lives.

Chores by Age: Building a Progression That Actually Prepares Them

Assigning age-appropriate chores matters. Too easy and there is no growth. Too hard and confidence breaks before it builds. Here is a rough framework built around preparedness value:

Ages 4-6: Feeding pets, setting and clearing the table, picking up around the house, helping sort supplies by category.
Ages 7-10: Washing dishes, helping cook simple meals, basic garden tasks, sweeping and mopping, carrying and stacking firewood.
Ages 11-14: Cooking full meals unsupervised, doing laundry start to finish, maintaining a garden plot, basic tool use and maintenance.
Ages 15+: Managing household inventory, making supply runs, minor home repairs, fire building and maintenance, leading younger siblings through tasks.

Each tier builds on the last. By the time your child is a teenager, they should be a functional contributor to household resilience, not a dependent passenger.

The Mental Toughness Component

There is something that happens to a person, young or old, who completes a hard task they did not want to do. They learn they are capable of more than they thought. That knowledge is not small. It is the foundation of resilience.

Kids who do difficult chores regularly develop what psychologists call a growth mindset in practical terms: the lived understanding that effort produces results. For prepper families, this is especially important because a crisis does not ask whether you feel ready. You either have the internal strength to push through or you do not.

Every time a child completes a chore that was hard or unpleasant, they are banking a small proof that they can handle discomfort. That bank account matters when the stakes get real.

Making Chores Count: Frame Them Right

How you talk about chores in your household shapes how your kids relate to work. If chores are presented as punishment or as something to endure, kids will associate productive labor with suffering. If they are framed as contribution and training, the mindset shifts.

Prepper families have an advantage here. You can be honest with your kids about why these skills matter. Not in a fear-based way, but in a straightforward, practical way: we take care of what we have, we know how to do things ourselves, and we do not wait for someone else to handle what we can handle. That is a value system, not just a chore schedule.

Tie the chore to the skill explicitly. “You are learning to build a fire because if we ever lose power in winter, you will know how to keep us warm.” That context turns a task into training. Kids respond to purpose.

Raise Kids Who Know How To Survive, Not Just Scroll

One thing the Amish understood long before modern parenting books existed is that children become capable adults by participating in real life early. They learn responsibility by doing meaningful work, not by being entertained every waking hour.

That is exactly why The Amish Ways resonates with so many prepper and homesteading families today.

Inside this book, you will discover practical old-world skills, self-reliance principles, food preservation methods, homestead habits, and family-centered traditions that helped Amish communities raise resilient, disciplined, highly capable children for generations — without depending on modern systems for everything.

If you want your kids to grow into adults who know how to work, adapt, solve problems, and contribute when life gets hard, this book is worth reading.

Get your copy of The Amish Ways and start rebuilding the kind of practical family culture that creates strong, prepared, self-reliant people.

Final Thoughts

The question of how do chores teach life skills is really a question about what kind of adults you are raising. Chores done consistently and intentionally build competence, discipline, problem-solving, and mental toughness. For preppers, those are not optional traits. They are the core of what it means to be ready.

Start young. Stay consistent. Raise the difficulty over time. Let them fail and figure it out. The child who has been doing real work since they were four years old is not going to be helpless when the situation demands something of them. They have been preparing their whole life.

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The post How Do Chores Teach Life Skills? The Answer Every Prepper Parent Needs to Hear appeared first on Ask a Prepper.

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Monday, May 11, 2026

11 Things You Should Never (Ever!) Add to Your Stockpile

When it comes to building a solid emergency stockpile, most advice focuses on what to store. And that makes sense – you want to be ready for whatever comes your way. But the thing is that knowing what to leave out of your stockpile is just as important as knowing what to put in it. Some items will go bad faster than you think, others will take up space without giving you much in return, and a few could even put your health at risk when you need to be at your best.

Let’s go through the few things that have no business sitting on your storage shelves, no matter how good an idea they might seem at first glance.

11. Whole Wheat Flour

This one is going to surprise a lot of people, because whole wheat flour feels like such a natural choice for a long-term pantry. It’s wholesome, it’s useful, and you can make bread with it – what’s not to love?

Well, the problem is that whole wheat flour contains the entire grain kernel, including the germ. That germ is packed with natural oils, and those oils go rancid over time, even when the flour is sealed up tight.

We’re talking about a shelf life of roughly three to six months at room temperature, and maybe up to a year if you freeze it. Compare that to plain white rice or dried beans, which can last for decades when stored the right way, and you can see why whole wheat flour is a poor choice for any stockpile meant to last.

If you want the ability to make this dandelion bread recipe, for example, or other baked goods during a long-term situation, store whole wheat berries instead. The intact grain stays good for years and years, and you can grind it into fresh flour whenever you need it using a simple hand-cranked grain mill.

10. Powdered Milk from the Grocery Store

Regular powdered milk from the baking aisle of your local grocery store is not the same product as the long-term storage powdered milk sold by preparedness companies. Grocery store powdered milk is typically non-instant and has a shelf life of about one to two years at best. It also tends to taste pretty bad, which matters more than you might think when you’re trying to get adequate nutrition during a difficult time.

How to Make Butter Last Forever

If milk is something you want in your stockpile – and it’s a solid choice because of the protein, calcium, and calories it provides – invest in properly packaged instant powdered milk that’s been sealed in nitrogen-flushed cans. These can last 20 years or more and actually taste decent when mixed with cold water.

9. Cheap, Off-Brand Canned Goods You’ve Never Tried

There’s a strong temptation to load up on whatever is cheapest when you’re building a large food stockpile, and that’s understandable. But filling your shelves with canned foods you’ve never actually tasted is a gamble you don’t want to take.

Beyond the taste issue, some bargain-brand canned goods have questionable quality control. Dented cans, inconsistent seals, and poor nutritional content are more common when you’re buying from unknown brands. Always taste-test before you buy in bulk, and stick with brands you actually enjoy eating. Your future self will thank you.

That said, cheap doesn’t have to mean bad. I’ve spent a lot of time hunting for the sweet spot between price and quality, and I’ve found several cans at Walmart that come in under $1 each and have held up for years in my root cellar – still tasting good after long-term storage, which is the only test that actually matters. I put together a full 3-month food plan built around affordable but proven items, and you can check it out here.

8. Trail Mix and Granola Bars

These are fantastic for a 72-hour bug-out bag or a short camping trip, but they have no place in a long-term stockpile. Most trail mixes contain nuts and seeds that are high in oils, and those oils go rancid within a few months, especially in warm storage conditions. Granola bars tend to go stale and lose their texture relatively fast as well, even when they’re still within the date printed on the wrapper.

The chocolate chips in trail mix will melt and re-solidify into an unappetizing mess, the dried fruit can ferment, and the overall product just doesn’t hold up for more than six months to a year.

If you want calorie-dense snack options for your stockpile, consider things like this super easy hard candy recipe, honey, peanut butter in sealed jars, or commercially freeze-dried fruit, all of which last much longer and hold up far better in storage.

7. Brown Rice

Just like whole wheat flour, brown rice is often seen as the healthier option, and in everyday life, it absolutely is. But for stockpiling purposes, it’s a terrible choice. Brown rice still has its outer bran layer intact, which contains oils that will go rancid within about six months to a year, even under good storage conditions.

Try This Recipe: Long-Lasting Amish Chili Soup

White rice, on the other hand, has had that bran layer removed, which is exactly why it can last 25 to 30 years when properly stored in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers. When it comes to your emergency food supply, white rice wins by a landslide. You can always supplement the missing nutrients with other stored foods like canned vegetables or a good multivitamin.

6. Medications Past Their Expiration Date

This one might ruffle a few feathers, because there’s a popular belief in preparedness circles that most medications are still perfectly fine well past their printed expiration dates. And while there is some truth to that for certain drugs, the reality is more complicated than most people realize.

Some medications, like tetracycline antibiotics, can actually become toxic as they degrade. Liquid medications tend to break down much faster than pills. And critical items like EpiPens, insulin, and nitroglycerin lose their effectiveness in ways that could genuinely put your life in danger if you’re counting on them during an emergency. Here’s what actually happens when you take expired medications

Instead of hoarding expired medications, work on rotating your supply so that what you have on hand is always reasonably fresh. Talk to your doctor about getting a slightly larger prescription if emergency preparedness is a concern – many healthcare providers are understanding about this.

As a backup, you must learn how to make this DIY natural antibiotic recipe and make sure you have these 3 antibiotics stockpiled and rotated – because without them, your chances of survival drop fast. in a crisis.

5. Vegetable Oils in Bulk

Cooking oil is useful, there’s no argument about that. But large quantities of vegetable oil (corn, soybean, canola) have a surprisingly short shelf life compared to what most people assume.

Once the seal is broken, most vegetable oils start going rancid within a few months, and even unopened bottles typically last only one to two years before the flavor and nutritional value start to decline.

Rancid oil doesn’t just taste awful – it can also cause digestive problems and contains harmful free radicals that you don’t want in your body, especially during a time when you need to stay healthy.

Better alternatives for long-term storage include:

Coconut oil (which can last two or more years and is naturally resistant to going bad).
Olive oil in dark glass bottles.
Ghee, which has been used for centuries in the Amish community – Find the original recipe here!

4. Bleach in Large Quantities

Yes, bleach can be used to purify water in a pinch, and it’s a great disinfectant. But people tend to go overboard and store gallons upon gallons of it, thinking it will last forever. It won’t. Regular household bleach starts to lose its strength after about six to twelve months, and after a year or so, it may not be strong enough to reliably purify water anymore.

On top of that, storing large amounts of bleach in a confined space creates a genuine safety hazard. The fumes alone can cause problems if a container cracks or leaks, especially if it’s stored near other cleaning products that could cause a chemical reaction. A much better approach is to keep a small, fresh supply and rotate it regularly.

Bleach works in a pinch, but after rotating bottles for years and never being fully sure the stuff was still strong enough to trust, I started looking into atmospheric water generators – and I haven’t looked back since. These devices pull moisture straight from the air and filter it into clean drinking water.

I tested mine during a long winter stay at a remote family cabin in the mountains, and even in cold, dry conditions, it kept producing enough water every single day. If water is the weak spot in your preparedness plan (and for most people it is), this is the one I personally use and recommend.

3. Tons of MREs

MREs are designed for soldiers in the field who are burning through thousands of calories a day during intense physical activity. They’re calorie-dense, compact, and require no preparation, which makes them sound perfect for a stockpile. But there are some serious downsides that get overlooked.

First, they’re expensive – building a stockpile of MREs for a family of four for even a month would cost a small fortune. Second, the sodium content in MREs is extremely high, which can lead to dehydration and high blood pressure. Third, anyone who has actually eaten MREs for more than a few days in a row can tell you that the digestive issues are real and unpleasant. They’re designed for short-term use in extreme situations, not for weeks or months of daily eating.

So instead of spending a fortune on MREs that wreck your stomach and expire faster than you’d think, try making your own shelf-stable meals that actually taste like real food. This hamburger and gravy meal in a bag costs a fraction of the price, and with freeze-dried beef packed in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers, it’ll last 5 to 10 years easily – sometimes even longer if you keep it cool and dry.

Here’s exactly how to make it:

2. Fuel Without a Proper Rotation Plan

Stockpiling gasoline, diesel, or kerosene makes sense in theory – you might need to power a generator, run a vehicle, or fuel a heater. But fuel degrades over time, and most people store it and then forget about it.

Gasoline starts breaking down within three to six months and can gum up engines, clog fuel lines, and become genuinely useless if left sitting long enough. Even with fuel stabilizers like Sta-Bil, you’re looking at a maximum of about one to two years before it becomes unreliable.

Never Stockpile This Type of Fuel!

The bigger concern is safety. Improperly stored fuel is a fire hazard and a health hazard due to fumes, and local regulations in many areas limit how much fuel you can legally store on your property. If you do keep fuel on hand, keep the amount reasonable, use stabilizers, label every container with the date you filled it, and rotate it into your everyday vehicles on a regular schedule.

1. Seeds that Aren’t Suited to Your Climate

Growing your own food is a wonderful long-term survival strategy, and having a supply of seeds stored away is genuinely smart planning. But a lot of people make the mistake of buying pre-packaged “survival seed vaults” without checking whether the varieties included will actually grow in their specific climate and soil conditions.

If you live in the northern part of the country with a short growing season, seeds for crops that need long, hot summers (like certain varieties of watermelon or sweet potatoes) aren’t going to do you much good. And if you’ve never gardened before, a crisis situation is the worst possible time to figure it out for the first time.

The best approach is to buy open-pollinated and heirloom seeds that are known to do well in your specific region, and then actually practice growing them in your garden now, while the stakes are low.

One more thing about seeds that most people miss entirely – food is only half the equation. What about medicine? Chamomile, yarrow, echinacea, calendula – these aren’t just pretty plants. They’re the antibiotics, painkillers, and wound treatments that kept people alive long before pharmacies existed. This medicinal seed kit gives you all of them in one pack, ready to grow. Food crops keep you fed, but these are the ones that could save your life. I bought them from here.

If You Already Stockpiled These…

Don’t panic, and definitely don’t throw everything in the trash. If you’ve been reading this list and realizing that half your storage shelves are full of the items mentioned above, the good news is that most of them are still perfectly usable right now.

They just won’t hold up for the long haul, and that’s the key difference. The smart move isn’t to waste what you already spent money on – it’s to use it up, learn from it, and replace it with better options going forward.

Here’s a quick action plan, item by item:

Whole wheat flour and brown rice – Open them up and do a sniff test. If the flour smells bitter, stale, or like old paint, it’s rancid and needs to go. If it still smells fine, move it into your everyday kitchen and use it up over the next few weeks. Same with brown rice – if it looks and smells normal, start cooking with it now.
Vegetable oils – Check the dates on every bottle and do a quick taste test. Rancid oil has a sharp, unpleasant flavor that’s impossible to miss. If it still tastes clean, move it to the front of your kitchen pantry and use it in your daily cooking before it turns.
Cheap canned goods you’ve never tried – This week is tasting week. Open a few cans from each brand and find out what you’re actually working with. If they taste decent, great – keep that brand in your rotation. Donate anything you truly won’t eat, and from now on, only stockpile products you’ve already tested and enjoyed. I’ve personally taste-tested these under $1 cans from Walmart and genuinely enjoy them.
Expired medications – This one needs a careful sort. Look up each specific medication online to check whether it’s a type that simply loses strength over time or one that can become harmful (like certain antibiotics). Use what’s still good, and bring anything that’s too far gone to your local pharmacy for safe disposal – most pharmacies accept expired medications.
MREs, trail mix, and granola bars – The easiest fix on this list: just eat them. Pack them for your next road trip, bring them on a hike, toss a few in your work bag for lunch, or hand them out to the kids as snacks. T
Bleach and fuel – Check your bleach for its manufacture date. If it’s been more than a year, it’s likely too weak to reliably purify water, so use it for general household cleaning and pick up a fresh bottle along with some calcium hypochlorite for your long-term water plan. For stored fuel, pour it into your vehicle’s gas tank (as long as it hasn’t turned into a gummy mess), and going forward, label every container with the fill date so you can rotate it on a regular schedule.
Seeds you haven’t tested – If you’ve got a survival seed vault sitting unopened in a closet, don’t just leave it there and hope for the best. Open it up this spring and actually plant a test garden with what’s inside. Find out which varieties grow well in your area and which ones are a waste of time.

The point here isn’t to feel bad about what you’ve already bought – every single person who takes prepping seriously has made purchases they later realized weren’t the best use of their money or shelf space. That’s just part of the learning process, and the fact that you’re reading articles like this one means you’re already thinking more carefully than most people do.

Use up what you have, take note of what worked and what didn’t, and make smarter choices as you rebuild and improve your stockpile over time.

You may also like:

7 Stores Where You Can Buy Cheap Survival Food

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Hoarding These Items Might Get You Arrested

The post 11 Things You Should Never (Ever!) Add to Your Stockpile appeared first on Ask a Prepper.

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How to Make Your Own Garlic Powder

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

Garlic powder is definitely one of the most important ingredients in my kitchen. I use it when making chili, meatloaf, spaghetti, casseroles, and all sorts of other dishes. It's one of those things that goes into just about everything I cook, and I'd hate to run out.

Why make it at home when you can just buy it? For one, you'll save money. You'll spend half as much on garlic cloves as you would on premade powder. For example, you can often find pre-peeled garlic cloves in bulk, something like 6 pounds for under $20, and that kind of supply can last you a couple of years.

Granted, we're only talking ten or twenty dollars either way. But the other reason is quality. Homemade garlic powder has a much better flavor, and you'll notice the difference when cooking with it. The taste is actually bolder than store-bought, so keep in mind you won't need to use quite as much.

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Plus, making garlic powder is fairly easy, as you'll see in this method I found on the Youtube channel, Brad and Christa. You can watch their video and read the instructions below.

Here's what you'll need:

Peeled garlic cloves
Food processor
Parchment paper
Food dehydrator
Blender (or coffee grinder)

Here's how to make it:

Step 1 – Put the cloves into the food processor and grind them up. Work in small batches so the pieces come out nice and fine and uniform. This also helps them dehydrate faster.

Step 2 – Put a piece of parchment paper on the jelly tray of your dehydrator, and spread the ground cloves onto it. Make sure they're spread out evenly with no large clumps, so the air can flow through properly.

Note: The parchment paper is really important. Garlic gets sticky when dehydrating, and without the parchment paper, you'll have a mess on your hands.

Step 3 – Take the dehydrator outside so it doesn't stink up your home for weeks (trust me on this one), set it to 160°F, and leave it for several hours.

Don't even bother checking it for the first eight hours. You want to get all the moisture out, so make sure the garlic is completely, 100% dry before moving on. You can occasionally give it a gentle swoosh to break up any clumps that form.

Step 4 – Pour the dehydrated garlic into your blender and blend it into a powder. A coffee grinder or stick blender attachment works just as well. It won't be quite as fine as store-bought garlic powder, but it will taste better. Grind it as coarse or fine as you like.

Once you try homemade garlic powder, it's hard to go back to the stuff in the little jar at the grocery store. It's one of those small changes that makes a real difference in your cooking, and the process is simple enough that there's really no reason not to do it.

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Do Amish People Use Electricity? The Full Truth About Their Energy Rules

If you’ve ever driven through Amish country and noticed a solar panel on a barn roof or heard the hum of a diesel generator behind a woodworking shop, you probably did a double-take. The popular image of the Amish as people who flatly reject all electricity is one of the most widespread misconceptions in American culture. The real answer is layered, practical, and frankly, something every serious prepper should study.

The short version: most Amish do not connect to the public utility grid. But that is very different from saying they live without electricity. Millions of people across the country are only now beginning to figure out how to live off-grid, while Amish communities have been running independent power systems for generations. Understanding how they do it, and why, offers a blueprint that holds up whether you’re concerned about grid failure, economic collapse, or simply reducing your dependence on systems outside your control.

The Real Question Is Not Whether They Use Electricity, But Where It Comes From

The Amish relationship with electricity comes down to one core principle: separation from the world. Connecting to the public power grid means becoming dependent on an outside institution, one that delivers not just electricity but television signals, internet connections, and an endless stream of cultural influence directly into the home. That is what the Amish have historically refused, not electrons themselves.

Each Amish community operates under a set of community standards called the Ordnung, a German word meaning order. The Ordnung is not a written legal code but a living set of expectations maintained by each local church district. What one district permits, the next district might prohibit. This is why sweeping generalizations about the Amish and technology are almost always incomplete. According to the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College, the Old Order Amish forbid tapping electricity from public utility lines as a core restriction, but they do not prohibit electricity generated and controlled on their own property.

This distinction is everything. It means an Amish farmer can run a milking machine off a diesel generator, charge batteries with a solar panel, and power LED lighting through a 12-volt system, all without violating the Ordnung, as long as the power source is self-contained and owned by the community.

Why the Public Grid Specifically Is the Problem

To outsiders, avoiding power lines while accepting generators or solar panels can look contradictory. But from inside the Amish worldview, the logic is consistent. Running a power line from the street into the home is a physical connection to the outside world. Once that connection exists, there is no practical limit to what can be plugged into it.

Amish parents are deeply concerned about outside influence on their children. A house with standard electrical outlets becomes a house that could have televisions, gaming consoles, computers, and internet routers. By refusing the public grid entirely, the community creates a structural barrier against those influences, not just a rule that individuals have to enforce by willpower every day.

Scholar Donald Kraybill, who has studied Amish culture extensively, has described Amish-generated electricity from off-grid sources like solar as tapping into “God’s grid,” a phrase that captures how the Amish distinguish between power they control and power that connects them to the outside world. That framing matters. It is not about rejecting technology in some abstract sense. It is about maintaining sovereignty over what enters the community.

How Different Amish Groups Handle Electricity

Not all Amish communities draw the line in the same place. Understanding the major affiliations helps clarify why you might see one Amish farm with a generator shed and another that uses only propane and kerosene.

Old Order Amish

The Old Order represents the largest and most widely recognized Amish affiliation. They use horse-drawn transportation, conduct worship services in private homes, and prohibit connection to public utility lines. Within that constraint, individual districts vary considerably. Some allow 12-volt battery systems for lighting. Others permit diesel generators for farm operations. Many have adopted solar panels to charge batteries and power electric fencing or water pumps. The Old Order is not a monolith. A community in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania may have different rules than one in Holmes County, Ohio, even though both are considered Old Order.

New Order Amish

The New Order Amish split from the Old Order beginning in the 1960s over issues of spiritual practice and community discipline. They maintain horse-and-buggy transportation and plain dress but have generally more relaxed technology standards. Many New Order churches permit electricity in the home, though rules still vary by region. Some New Order churches in Holmes County, Ohio, for example, do not allow electric lights on the main floor of the house, while New Order communities in other areas permit household electricity more broadly. New Order Amish are also more open to telephones in the home and, in some cases, allow air travel.

Swartzentruber Amish

At the most conservative end of the spectrum sit the Swartzentruber Amish. They reject technologies that many Old Order communities permit, including indoor plumbing in some cases, rubber tires on farm equipment, and battery-powered lights in homes. Some Swartzentruber communities allow only kerosene lanterns and strictly limit generator use. Their restrictions are among the most comprehensive of any Amish affiliation still functioning in significant numbers.

Beachy Amish and Amish Mennonites

The Beachy Amish occupy a different category entirely. They own automobiles, connect to the public utility grid for home electricity, use computers for business purposes, and engage in active missionary work. According to Elizabethtown College’s Amish Studies program, the Beachy Amish and Amish Mennonites use public utility electricity. Theologically, they share roots with the Old Order but have accepted a significantly higher degree of modern technology. The Amish Mennonites sit further still in the direction of mainstream evangelical Christianity.

The Alternative Power Systems Amish Communities Actually Use

Understanding how Amish communities generate and use off-grid power is directly relevant to anyone building a self-sufficient household or retreat. These systems have been field-tested across generations of practical use.

Diesel and Gasoline Generators

Generators have been a staple of Amish power infrastructure for decades. When government regulations required dairy farmers to refrigerate milk before pickup, Amish farmers installed diesel generators to run milk coolers. That same generator then powered woodworking tools, air compressors, and other farm equipment. Generators are typically housed in separate sheds rather than inside homes or workshops, creating physical distance from the noise and fumes while keeping the technology visible as a separate system rather than a hidden household convenience.

12-Volt Battery Systems

The 12-volt DC system is one of the most widespread solutions in Amish communities. Deep-cycle batteries, similar to marine batteries or car batteries but designed for repeated discharge and recharge, store power for lighting, fans, water pumps, and small appliances. Inverters convert 12-volt DC into 110-volt AC for devices that require standard current. According to reporting in Anabaptist World, restrictions in many communities are placed on loads rather than on the systems themselves, meaning the battery bank may be permitted while specific high-power appliances remain off-limits.

Solar Power

Solar adoption among Amish communities has accelerated significantly over the past decade, and the trend shows no signs of slowing. What makes solar particularly compatible with Amish values is that it requires no monthly bill, no connection to outside infrastructure, and no grid dependency. A modest system of one to two panels with battery storage is sufficient to power LED lighting, a water pump, and a few essential appliances across a typical Amish household.

One Amish-owned solar installation company in Indiana, Wellspring Components, began as a buggy repair shop before expanding into solar installation over 27 years ago. The company reports that the same basic system that once cost over $1,000 now costs approximately $150, making off-grid solar accessible even to the most resource-conscious communities. Some Amish businesses have invested in large-scale solar arrays to replace diesel generators that were costing tens of thousands of dollars annually in fuel.

Compressed Air and Hydraulic Power

Many Amish workshops run power tools through compressed air rather than electric motors. A gasoline or diesel engine powers a compressor, which then drives pneumatic saws, drills, and other tools through air lines. This approach allows high-powered production work without direct electrical connections. Hydraulic systems work on the same principle, with fluid pressure doing the work that electric motors would otherwise handle. These systems are common in Amish furniture shops, construction crews, and farm operations.

Propane and Kerosene

Propane handles a substantial portion of Amish household energy needs. Gas-powered refrigerators, stoves, water heaters, and lights are standard equipment across most Old Order communities. Propane does not require any connection to the grid, can be delivered and stored on-site, and provides reliable energy for cooking and heating independent of weather or battery charge levels. Kerosene lamps remain in use in more conservative communities and as backup lighting elsewhere.

Wind Power

Windmills have long been used in Amish communities to pump water from wells. Roof-mounted small wind turbines have become more common in recent years in some regions, providing an additional charging source for battery systems. While wind power is less universally adopted than solar or diesel, it fits naturally with the Amish preference for self-generated, grid-independent energy.

How the Decision-Making Process Actually Works

One of the most instructive aspects of Amish technology management for preppers and self-sufficiency practitioners is the deliberate, community-based process through which new technologies are evaluated. The Amish do not adopt new tools because they are new. They also do not reject them because they are new. Each technology is assessed based on whether it strengthens or weakens community cohesion, family bonds, and spiritual focus.

When a new tool or system appears, a bishop or church leadership may permit one or several households to try it on a trial basis. The community observes whether the technology creates pride, introduces outside influence, encourages idleness, or disrupts relationships. If it passes that evaluation over time, wider adoption may follow. If it causes problems, it gets restricted or prohibited.

This process means Amish communities adapt slowly but purposefully. They are not technophobic. They are selective. The result is communities that have been quietly living off-grid, managing their own power systems, and maintaining food production and craft skills for generations while the surrounding world grew increasingly dependent on centralized infrastructure.

What the Population Numbers Tell You

As of June 2025, the Amish population in North America stands at approximately 410,955 people, according to the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies. That represents a 131 percent increase since 2000, when the population was approximately 177,910. The population doubles roughly every 20 years, driven by large families and an average retention rate of 85 percent or more. Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana together account for approximately 61 percent of the total North American Amish population.

These numbers matter because they tell you that Amish off-grid living is not a remnant of a dying tradition. It is a growing model practiced by over 400,000 people in 32 states and three Canadian provinces. Communities are not struggling to survive their energy choices. They are expanding.

What Preppers Should Take Away From the Amish Approach to Energy

The Amish are not running off-grid as an emergency contingency plan. They are running off-grid as a permanent operational model. That is a fundamentally different mindset than most preppers start with, and it produces fundamentally different results.

The key lessons from the Amish energy model:

Grid independence is built through layered systems, not single solutions. Amish communities combine propane, diesel generators, battery banks, solar, and pneumatic power. No single failure takes down everything.
Restricting the loads matters as much as building the supply. The Amish do not try to generate enough power to live a modern American lifestyle off-grid. They redesign the lifestyle to fit what off-grid power can reliably provide.
Technology decisions should be tested before widespread adoption. Running one generator in a separate shed before wiring the whole farm is a risk management strategy as much as it is a cultural practice.
Community infrastructure is more resilient than individual infrastructure. The Amish model of communal work, shared tools, and collective decision-making distributes both the costs and the risks.
Low-tech backups are always maintained alongside higher-tech systems. Kerosene lamps do not disappear when a community adds solar panels. The fallback is always there.

For anyone building out a homestead, a retreat property, or a suburban backup power system, the Amish track record on these principles is worth more than any theoretical framework. These are people who have field-tested off-grid living under real-world conditions, across multiple generations, through economic downturns, harsh winters, and technological change, and they have done it while growing their communities rather than shrinking them.

Common Misconceptions Worth Clearing Up

“The Amish are completely against electricity”

This is the most common misunderstanding. Most Amish communities use electricity generated from sources they control. The restriction is against public grid connection, not against electric current.

“All Amish communities have the same rules”

There are hundreds of distinct Amish affiliations and thousands of individual church districts, each with its own Ordnung. Rules about solar panels, generators, battery-powered lights, and propane appliances vary significantly from district to district and state to state.

“Amish technology restrictions are arbitrary or irrational”

The restrictions follow an internal logic rooted in community protection and spiritual priorities. Whether you share those priorities or not, the framework is coherent. Technologies that strengthen self-sufficiency and family cohesion while limiting outside influence get permitted. Technologies that introduce dependency, distraction, or individualism get restricted.

“The Amish are falling behind because of their restrictions”

The population data does not support this. With over 410,000 people across North America as of 2025 and consistent growth, Amish communities are not failing. They are one of the fastest-growing religious communities in the United States by percentage. Their energy model has not prevented economic activity. Amish businesses in furniture, construction, agriculture, and specialty manufacturing are competitive and well-regarded. An Amish-owned solar company in Indiana now saves clients tens of thousands of dollars annually in fuel costs by designing off-grid systems that work within Amish restrictions while outperforming the diesel setups they replace.

The Amish Did Not Learn Self-Sufficiency From YouTube

Long before modern Americans started panic-buying generators and searching for off-grid tutorials online, Amish families were already building independent systems that worked without the public grid.

They mastered food preservation, low-tech resilience, livestock management, woodworking, water systems, home medicine, fuel independence, and community-based survival generations ago — not as a hobby, but as a way of life.

That is exactly why so many preparedness-minded people are turning to The Amish Ways.

This book pulls back the curtain on practical Amish skills and old-world systems that helped families survive without depending on fragile modern infrastructure. Inside, you’ll discover forgotten techniques for food storage, gardening, natural remedies, self-reliance, off-grid living, and sustainable homesteading methods most people have completely lost touch with.

What You’ll Discover Inside The Amish Ways

Traditional Amish food preservation methods
Practical off-grid household systems
Self-sufficient gardening and farming techniques
Old-world herbal remedies and home medicine
Low-tech solutions that still work during outages and emergencies
Simple, durable lifestyle systems designed around resilience instead of convenience

If this article made you realize how dependent modern life has become on centralized systems… this is the next thing you should read.

Get your copy of The Amish Ways here!

Final Thoughts

The Amish do not plug into the public electricity grid. That is accurate and consistent across virtually all Amish communities. Beyond that single restriction, the picture becomes far more complicated and far more instructive. Different affiliations draw different lines. Different districts within the same affiliation interpret the Ordnung differently. What holds across essentially all Amish communities is the core principle: power should come from sources you own, control, and manage, not from systems that connect you to the outside world and all its influences.

For preppers, this is not just religious history. It is operational doctrine. A growing movement of over 400,000 people has demonstrated that grid independence is not a fringe concept or a temporary emergency measure. It is a viable, permanent way of organizing a productive community life. The Amish have the generators, the solar panels, the battery banks, the propane systems, and the agricultural skills to prove it.

The grid will fail at some point. It always does, whether locally or regionally, temporarily or for longer stretches. The question is not whether you will ever wish you had an independent power source. The question is whether you have built one before you need it. The Amish answered that question generations ago.

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