Did well thanks largely to our stove, water heater, and fireplace all being nat gas. Only had about 3 hours of power in a 36 hour period, but we were still able to cook and stay reasonably warm camping in front of the fireplace . I used some extra painters tape to add more support to our door weatherstripping. Have 400w outlet available on my 4runner but we never had to resort to using the vehicles

That said, I am adding an inverter generator to run the fridge, a space heater, and/or fans in summer along with some small electronics. The cold kept the fridge loss from being an issue because I moved some items to the garage and some outside, but an extended warm month storm outage would be an issue

ChipFTAC01 said:

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I think ive finally decided that I'd like some slippers. Never really saw the point. But my toes were cold even with thick socks.

Other than that I was ok with how well prepped we were. I'd let my canned soup stock dwindle too much so we only had a couple on hand. And I realized that can of Ranch style beans in the pantry are the ones with extra onions instead of regular. Need to rectify that.

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I've had these ugly MFers for 20 years. Only really get to use them every 2-3. Best indoor / outdoor "slippers" ever.

Alaskan Guide Sneakers -- originally from Cabela's. Get some if you can find some.

I had some ugg slippers that were comfy and warm as ***** Wear them a few times a year. Of course I couldn't find them the week leading up to this storm.

Was good on light sources, spare battery capacity, and propane.

Had to bring the gas grill inside to use the burner, only had a Little Buddy heater (3800 BTU) for heat. Need a little more heating capacity, ordered the bigger Mr. Heater with the adapter hose to hook it up to 20# propane tank. Plan to keep two cylinders always filled and in reserve.

Ordered a camp stove so I don't have to haul the grill inside or move to the garage.

Saw an interesting link on social media about setting up a small 1 person tent on a bed and covering with a blanket, and body heat can help keep that decently comfortable. For $30 a tent, this seems worth trying as well.

When they become available again, we'll definitely be looking at getting a good smaller generator that would be capable of keeping the fridge and freezer running, especially in a power outage during warmer months. I was lucky it was cold as balls, or I would have lost 3 deer worth of processed meat, and all the time I invested to process it, during the 4 days we had zero power.

We were out for 83 hours. Maintained water for the entire event.

I had about a half a cord of wood. I had access to about 4 cords, but would have to travel about 10 miles to get it - Between what I burned and shared with the neighbors I think we went through about 2 cords.
Food we were good on and we were able to salvage most meat and other items by putting them in the snow.
Had flashlights/candles/LED Coleman Lamp so lighting was ok.
Was able to charge phones in the truck and it served as my office during the event - I work for a electric utility so I was putting in 18 hour days in between trying to care for the family and house.

Need a battery powered radio, we came to dread the dark because it meant increasing cold in the house. I was able to maintain about 55-56 degrees most of the time. The radio would have broken the monotony for my wife and son.

One hack that the good Aggie that provided wood shared was Solar LED lawn lights. You could charge them during the day and use them at night for lighting.

Also, leverage the Aggie network when you need something by using Facebook on your phone. We were able to get people things they needed via that route.

i didn't lose power or water, but thinking for the next time, I have generator, had gas, but had nothing to plug in for heat source. So I could have tv and lights but no heat.

so looking to get get portable heater and just store it.

Also looking to put plug in wall so I can have my generator on back porch and then just plug extension cord into the adapter so I don't have to have window or door open to run extension cords

Any recs on two way radios/walkie talkies? I'd like to be able to reliably communicate with someone in another neighborhood about a mile away when roads and cell service are unavailable.

Lost powr for 32hrs but always had running water.

I had a stupid amount of flashlights, nightlights for the kids, glowsticks (also awesome for the kids) and batteries..

Ryobie One+ Lantern - This thing was clutch though. Uses the same batteries as my power tools, USB port.

I wish I knew how to properly use my fireplace. I had a neighbor come over and show us and gave us a couple logs of firewood. Got a guy coming out tomorrow to check and make sure it is clean and fully operational so I'll know in the future. Never been a thing I've cared about using.

Honestly I think we could have used one of our backup batteries to run a space heater to get more comfortable instead of hording power for "just in case" since we knew the weather was going to warm up.

Going to make sure everyone has a sleeping bag and at least 1 good set of cold weather gear.

A big ass whole home generator is going to happen as well.

No problem. Rolling blackouts for 4 days but never lost power more than 3 hours at a time. Usually it was an hour or less. We always have ~5 gallons of bottled water on hand. We filled the tub and a big bucket when water pressure started dropping. I split up a big large wagon load of post oak a couple days before the storm hit and put that in the garage and kept feeding that into the wood stove the whole time, kept the core of the house warm.
We live out in the country so we always have 7-10 days of food. Our Internet stayed up and we have some power bricks we kept charged when the power came back up, and were able to stay entertained and even worked all week remotely.
Covered the spigots each with 4-5 old socks, then a grocery bag wrapped on with tape, then an old hand towel, and another grocery bag and tape layer. That did the trick. When our house was previously remodeled, they insulated the pipes really well. In the attic.

Basically, aside from some of the rooms getting pretty cold a few nights, and having no shower for about 5 days, no problems.

Also, without power and using a fireplace/heat source, close all rooms that are not around the fireplace. Put towels under the doors to block airflow. I have a cathedral ceiling in my living room where the fireplace is (heat rises). At one point I was considering taking a tarp and creating a false ceiling. Make the airspace to be heated as small as possible.

Also, get some thick ass curtains for the night and utilize radiational heating as much as possible during the day.

We made it out OK. Had to improvise a bit, but at the end of the week, we decided:

1. Get some kerosene lamps. The antique looking ones that are decorative but functional. We've talked about this for a while, and I had a propane camp lantern that we ran a bit. We also had a bag of unscented emergency candles. But two or three kerosene lamps on stand-by would have been easier and safer.

2. Portable Propane Generator. Don't leave it at the ranch. Go ahead and bring it home.

3. Water well hook up. My water well is hardwired, and i have no real means of connecting a generator to it. I will be wiring up a plug for an extension cord. Then it's throw the breaker, plug it in. May do the same for the septic.

4. Small indoor propane heater. We have no fireplace or stove, so without electricity, we have no heat. Something small to just take the edge off.

5. 1 lb bottle refill adapter. Then I can refill from our bigger tank and feed item #4.

Our power was 8 hours off, 1 hour on for about two days. Not ideal, but it actually wasn't that bad. The one hour was just enough for the heat to catch up a bit, and for us to run water (especially hot water for our exterior inline heater). It did suck, but it was mostly mental.

With the above 5 things, the week would have been a breeze.

goatchze said:

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We made it out OK. Had to improvise a bit, but at the end of the week, we decided:

1. Get some kerosene lamps. The antique looking ones that are decorative but functional. We've talked about this for a while, and I had a propane camp lantern that we ran a bit. We also had a bag of unscented emergency candles. But two or three kerosene lamps on stand-by would have been easier and safer.

2. Portable Propane Generator. Don't leave it at the ranch. Go ahead and bring it home.

3. Water well hook up. My water well is hardwired, and i have no real means of connecting a generator to it. I will be wiring up a plug for an extension cord. Then it's throw the breaker, plug it in. May do the same for the septic.

4. Small indoor propane heater. We have no fireplace or stove, so without electricity, we have no heat. Something small to just take the edge off.

5. 1 lb bottle refill adapter. Then I can refill from our bigger tank and feed item #4.

Our power was 8 hours off, 1 hour on for about two days. Not ideal, but it actually wasn't that bad. The one hour was just enough for the heat to catch up a bit, and for us to run water (especially hot water for our exterior inline heater). It did suck, but it was mostly mental.

With the above 5 things, the week would have been a breeze.

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So talk to me like I am 3 years old. Are the propane heaters good to go for indoor use? Like the ones that you screw onto the top of the small propane canister? The only time I have used them is outdoors or in a deer blind. I ran the hell out of my fireplace, but always worried about carbon monoxide, do these add to that risk? I have never been educated that.

Thanks

I was on a lease years ago in South Texas that had a hunting shack heated with natural gas.
We ran them during the day & kept a few windows cracked. At night they were shut off while we slept.

Also kept an old coffee or soup can of water on top of the stoves to help humidify the air a little. Don't know if it helped or not, but that's what the olds told me to do.

We have a number of CO detectors in our house since we have gas appliances, but for redundancy I did move an extra one to the living room when we were sleeping in front of the fire. Anyone with gas in their house should have them already, but anyone with electric heat but a backup plan to run any sort of combustible heat inside needs to get one (or more) too

Following up... I've bought water storage, a propane burner, battery powered radio, two cases of MRE's and I'm trying different freeze dried foods.

I had this for lunch today and it is excellent for freeze dried food. Good quantity, filling, hydrates well etc... I would eat this even if it weren't an emergency. Expensive but worth it.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07BRC3FGM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&th=1&psc=1

BaitShack said:

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Following up... I've bought water storage, a propane burner, battery powered radio, two cases of MRE's and I'm trying different freeze dried foods.

I had this for lunch today and it is excellent for freeze dried food. Good quantity, filling, hydrates well etc... I would eat this even if it weren't an emergency. Expensive but worth it.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07BRC3FGM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&th=1&psc=1

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Thanks, great info and will have to try that Peak food!

What water storage did you get?

I have a 400W inverter I got from NT that can be plugged into a cigarette lighter or hooked up directly to a car battery. I finally pulled the battery out of my Tundra and hooked up the inverter to power our modem and recharge devices. I didn't do it until day 3 and power came back on the next day so we didn't run that battery down, but my plan was to keep swapping out and recharging batteries between our two vehicles if I needed to keep it up for a good while.

We were lucky in that while our electricity was off for many hours at a time, we did have gas for cooking and water for flushing.

I was unprepared in that I had purchased a GoalZero 1250 from a friend and never charged it up. That would've let us run an electric heater while the electricity was off.

We heard if you have gas, boil some water on your stove to help keep it warm. My wife won't boil water without putting in beans, and some sausage, and a ham bone. So that was good.