Power Out? Tips for Staying Warm and Sane | Totally Ready

Posted by Carolyn on Nov 8th, 2012 in Power outage | 0 comments

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I was amazed and disappointed as I watched the news last night. A reporter was touring the apartment of a family who has been without power for the past week. It was so frustrating to see them freezing when there are a few things they could have done to make a huge difference. If you are without power or know someone who is how many of the following have been done to help make life more comfortable. Please read these tips and let us know which you used and how it worked out. That said I felt the need to depart from our frugal living tips and passing along this information one more time.?

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1. Stay indoors as much as possible. If you need to leave the house, open and close the door quickly, and keep it closed, not propped open while you carry something in or out.

2. Close interior doors to rooms you will not use during the outage.

3. Candles: These should be available for use during a power outage but should never be used after a natural disaster until you are positive there are no gas leaks in your neighborhood. Gas leaks occur frequently after destructive disasters and many, many homes and lives have been lost in fires caused by gas explosions from lighting a candle. Candles sold in glass jars or bottles, such as religious candles, are by far the safest to use in appropriate situations. Don't forget about the battery powdered candles you have. Most are programmable and make great night nights without running down the batteries.

4. Go to the basement or garage and get out the solar powdered landscape lights. Put them out in the sun during the day and bring them in at night.

5. Battery Clock: During an emergency, time seems to crawl by. Move your clock to a common area where everyone can check the time. Every home should have at least one clock that is battery operated.

6. Remember to NEVER use a barbeque in the house either for heat or for cooking. In an extreme emergency such as a blizzard, when there is no other option for heating food and water, place a barbeque in the garage, OPEN the garage door and remove the car before starting the grill, keeping the door open the entire time. You will need to cook in your down coat but you will keep your family safe from toxic fumes. You cannot use a household pan on an open fire or grill but a griddle will act like a frying pan if you are using either of these methods to cook. Remember to eat the food in the freezer first. If your outage may be long cook everything. Once cooked food will keep for a few days packed in snow or ice you chip from the yard. If your temperatures are below freezing place some small containers of water in the yard and wait for them to freeze. Once frozen place them in a cooler to keep food preserved.

7. Think Hot: It is important to eat and drink hot foods.

8. Dress in loose fitting layers. Trapped air between layers helps to insulate thus keeping you warm. As it gets dark it will get colder. Layer your clothing to maintain as constant a body temperature as possible. If you don?t over dress early in the day you can avoid overheating and then being chilled as the temperatures fall. Protect your internal organs by keeping your core, chest area, warm.

10. Extra Blankets and Sleeping Bags: These will not only be useful at night for sleeping but also to keep warm during the daylight hours. Don?t forget the mylar blanket in your 72-hour kit. Use your resources to their best advantage. Zip two sleeping bags together and sleep two to a bag, if appropriate. The combined body heat will keep you warmer than sleeping alone. Contain your body heat as much as possible. Remember when as children you built forts under a kitchen table covered with a large blanket? This is a great way to contain heat. Drape the table with the survival blanket from your 72-hour kit, blankets, canvas tarps, or bedspreads and then place throw rugs or even a mattress under the table, crawl in, and snuggle under a blanket and you will be surprised how warm you will be. Two and three man tents set up in the living room can achieve the same result. Both of these ?tents? are another great place to use your glow sticks or flameless candles.

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11. Speaking of tents, bring in your tent and set it up in the room of your home that you are using as the ?warm? room in your home. Play games in the tent during the day and sleep in it at night. Two man tents and play tents that you may have for your children also work for containing heat. If you have a fireplace in a bedroom prepare to sleep in that room and if you want to sleep in your bed place your 2 man tent on the bed, now you have the comfort of the mattress and the warmth of the tent.

12. Do not drink alcohol or eat salty foods. They dehydrates the body and your water supply will be limited.

13. Remember canned foods contain water or syrup which can help hydrate and they can be eaten cold if necessary. Do not discard the water or syrup use it to reconstitute dehydrated or freeze dried foods, without reconstituting dehydration can occur and can lead to serious health problems.

14. Designate a room or two to be used as the room(s) you will gather in during the day and sleep in at night. Close off all other, unneeded rooms. Take personal items from bedrooms and close the doors. What little heat you generate from a fireplace you will want to retain in the rooms where you will live during the outage. The family should gather in one or two rooms and use only one restroom until power is restored.

15. Close off hallways by hanging blankets or other fabrics across them. Remember the draperies between rooms in the 1800s and even into the 1940s? These were closed to seal off rooms. To seal off a hallway use your shower curtain rod hanging it as close to the ceiling as possible.

16. Place rolled up towels and rags under and around doors and windows where weather stripping may not completely seal the area.

17. As soon as the sun goes down cover windows in the rooms in which the family is gathered. You will be amazed how this can make a difference in the temperature in your room. Blinds are not enough. Once again, the mylar blankets from your 72-hour kits work great for this. You can also use blankets, sheets, tarps, plastic sheeting and drapery for this purpose. Newspaper in layers is a great insulator, too. At night, wind chill will become a real factor in keeping your home warm. Do all you can to keep the wind outside by using weather strip and caulking where necessary.

18. Games: Make sure games, books, and puzzles are easily accessible in the room you have deswignated as the gathering place, and use them to help pass the time. When the sun goes down place a flashlight, battery-powered lantern, or glow stick in the middle of the floor and huddle around it like a campfire. Drink hot cocoa and tell family stories or appropriate spooky tales (like Ichabod Crane and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow). By appropriate, I mean go easy on the scary stuff with young children if you want a full night's sleep.

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With a little bit of preparation, a power outage can be a memorable adventure for your family.

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Source: http://blog.totallyready.com/power-out-tips-for-staying-warm-and-sane/11/08/

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