Reevaluating Your Preparedness Supplies and Gear

When it comes time to reevaluate your BOB, preparedness gear, and emergency supplies, here are some things to keep in mind:

• With your emergency food supplies, be sure to incorporate them into your normal food rotation. For food in your BOB, change it out completely every six months.
• Always check everything with a battery (flashlights, radios, etc) to make sure the batteries still work. Consider replacing the spare batteries straight out--use the older batteries for your home electronics and put spare packs of fresh batteries in your BOBs and with your survival supplies.
• Try on your clothes! I generally revamp my BOB every six months or so. Be sure to actually try on the clothes that are set aside in your BOB and with your survival gear because we tend to grow over time and you want to know that the clothes will actually fit when the time comes to use them.
• Always rotate medications continuously as these tend to expire very quickly.
• Consider survival supplies that you may no longer be able to use. Case in point...I have heavy ropes which are knotted and tied to each bed post in all of our second floor bedrooms. Now a few decades ago I may have just jumped out of the window in an emergency. A couple of decades ago, I came up with the knotted rope idea as a way to exit these upper floor rooms in an emergency; simply toss the rope out the window and climb down. Now I am reconsidering how people (us and guests who are getting a bit older and less limber) might exit these rooms. I am thinking about getting the rope ladders that can hang from the windows and allow people to climb down for a quick escape. As people get older, considerations need to be made for physical abilities that may not have had to be considered years ago.
• Consider survival supplies (and gear) that you didn't need before but may need now. Acquiring a new kid, a new pet, or a new person in your life or moving to a new location or acquiring a new place to live or...you get the idea. Any new change in your household or to your household will require you to make changes in your survival supplies. Baby supplies, pet supplies, or supplies for the elderly or infirm may not have been needed when you originally packed up your survival gear but things change and your emergency supplies need to change with these changes.