Emergency Plan

~ Getting prepared ~

On April 15, 2010 we were evacuated from our home because of wildfires that were a few blocks from our home. We were fortunate that we have no damage other than our home smelling like smoke for a few days. We knew there were fires but until the last minute we had no idea we were going to be evacuated. I went to pick up my girls from school and when I came back they were Not letting people back into our subdivision. My husband happened to be at home at the time and didn't have a way out so they allowed me to go back in to get him. We had been preparing all afternoon to head out of town for a family emergency so a blessing in disguise we already had packed bags. With the evacuation I took a about 2 minutes....not much time at all...to grab our important documents and a few other items that we weren't planning on taking with us and then we were off.

Even though we were slightly prepared in that all our important documents and bill information was all in one place and easy to grab and go. We found through this experience that we are totally Not prepared for any kind of evacuation like this.

It is a strange feeling pulling away from your home with your husband, kids and about three days worth of clothes and not knowing if you will have anything to come home to. Our mind frame was that "it's all just STUFF" we have insurance and it can all be replaced. But still every few minutes one of us would say...Oh we should have grabbed this or that. I was a little frantic when I realized I had taken my wedding rings off to exercise that morning and I forgot to put them back on.

In an attempt to get more prepared I'm starting to work on our Emergency binder. We will be purchasing a fire safe box to store it in. You may not always have the time to grab what you need so having the important stuff in a fire safe box should help ease the stress in a situation like this. I'm working on evacuation checklists. If we do have time to grab stuff what are the essentials we need to grab. This way we use our time efficiently by only grabbing what is on the list of "Must Haves".

Right now, I just have a binder with dividers and plastic sleeves. Here is what we have in ours so far : birth certificates, Social Security Cards, Shot records, last four years Taxes, copies of all bills, credit card information, banking information, insurance policies.

Things I still need to get : Contact information for family and local friends and make emergency checklists.

Everyone is different, Every region of the US is different so how I prepare may not be how you want to or need to prepare in your area for a disaster or emergency. When I first started looking into this a few months ago I didn't know where to even start. I found Food Storage Made Easy! You can sign up with them for FREE and they will send you a step by step check list every couple of weeks to help you get an emergency plan together for your family. Here is a link **Here**. This site is a good starting point. My suggestion is read through the information and then take what is usable for you and your family and step by step make a plan.

Reality is most of the things we can do to be better prepared won't cost us a dime! I would hate to look back and say "I wish I had taken the time to get my things in order". It took me a couple of hours to organized and get all our papers into the new binder. Well worth my time in the long run. Take it step by step and do what you can when you can. Better to do a little bit at a time than to do nothing at all.

I hope this was helpful in some way. I will be posting pictures and progress along my way as I continue to build our Family Emergency Plan!

If you have any personal experiences, suggestions, or insight on this topic please feel free to comment!