A light In The Dark

Here in the Pacific Northwest we are blessed with lots of trees, mostly needle trees but also deciduous trees.

When the wind blows stronger than normal tree limbs fall or whole trees can fall on power lines and then the power goes out.

Yep, out here they haven't become smart enough to put the power lines underground so they are very vulnerable. Our power has been out twice so far this fall.

Recently we had one of those wind storms with lots of rain and in the late afternoon everything went dark. Instead of turning the generator on right away we decided to light a couple of 6 1/2 day candles and enjoy the peace and quiet for a while.

A fire was already burning in the wood stove keeping the office nice and warm and when we were hungry we boiled some water on the wood stove, added some freeze dried food, waited 10 minutes for it to reconstitute and then had a nice warm meal.

There was plenty of water pressure in the water line so we could still wash our hands and wash the dishes.

What would we have done if there was no more water pressure, You ask?

There are many ways to create back ups. A generator can run the well pump and provide water pressure and can even run the water heater, if it is a powerful enough generator.

Gee, You could have a hot shower, how nice!

The generator will only be useful as long as you have fuel stored for it. So a back up to the back up is recommended.

The other alternative would be to either use the hand well pump to haul water to the house or get the water stored in water barrels or water jugs. (Of course you would have to store some water ahead of time, that's why it's called being prepared, not panicking and trying to figure out what to do after the power is out.)

To make sure the stored water is drinkable run it through a water filter or if not available at least boil it (on the wood stove).

Life can be comfortable when you prepare for a time, when modern conveniences like

electric heaters, stoves, computers, cell phones, washing machines, etc fail.

You can be cozy sitting by the fire and gentle candle light creating an almost magical atmosphere.

Living simply and Being prepared helps to make life easier and less stressful even in an emergency.

P.S.

Another use for the 6.5 day candles.

If you have a well and a pump house like we do, we use one or more candles to help keep the temperature in the pump house from freezing. We recently had a long cold spell with temps in the low 20's, enough to freeze the pipes without additional heat. It works great. Just saying.