| Prepared For Survival - Food Storage & Preparedness

This time of year there are many ways that you might lose money or be conned. A lot of bad people take advantage of others during the holidays. Here are some ways to easily safe-guard yourself and your money.

Ignore any junk mail that comes to your home. Just trash it.
Buy a shredder. Shred any paper that you plan on throwing out. Shred it before you throw it out so no one can get into your trash and find personal information or anything else they could use to steal your identity.
Don't have checks mailed to your home. Have them directly deposited to your checking account.
Get referrals before you have any home repairs. You should be the one looking for a repairman, not them just randomly knocking on your door. This is something that happens a lot when there is a disaster. Con artist repairmen know that people are needy when something bad happens and take advantage.
The government, IRS, or utilities will not call your home randomly wanting money. This is a tricky scam. There have been some here lately in our town where the local power company calling people and saying that the person has to pay a huge amount of money to keep their power on. A couple of people have fallen for it and not long after phone call their bank accounts were empty. Sad! So watch out for any phone calls from someone saying you owe a bill. Even when a actual bill collector calls say that you will wait on the paper bill and then pay it that way.
Stop and think before you act. Never give out credit card info or write a check until you are absolutely sure that it is for the right thing.

Check out scams on http://www.snopes.com.

Check out businesses on https://www.bbb.org/.

This is a great way to make a low cost, actually free, cold frame for your outdoor seeds that winter outside or to do seed starting inside for starting seeds indoors for the spring. We are doing this one. Getting our seeds started very soon indoors so they will be ready for planting outdoors. Or planting indoors in 5 gallon buckets. I have a few items that I want to do indoors. Will be easier for when we get our land to be able to take the plants with us.

But this simple and free milk jug seed starter is a great way to start...

Survival Seeds

Cut a gallon milk jug in half horizontally. Leave one edge intact so that it will act like a hinge.
You can throw away the cap. But, my creative son is wanting to save them to somehow make an outdoor "rug" with. Have them bottom up so that you can use it to scrape mud off shoes.
Punch several drainage holes into the bottom of the jug.
Fill the bottom with a few inches of potting soil.
Moisten it well and plant the seeds.
Close the top cover and secure with some duct tape.
Place the jug inside a clear plastic bag and twist tie closed. Since it is in a clear plastic bag it is like its own greenhouse.
Place in a sunny spot outside out of the way , so it will not be bothered or have to be moved.
Before transplanting , harden off the seedlings by taking the jug out of the bag and propping it open.