The 7 Day Challenge: Day 2

This is the challenge I knew would come and that I knew I would fail!

Jodi and Julie over at Food Storage Made Easy have posted the details of Day 2 of their 7 Day Challenge.  Today, they are asking us to simulate a scenario where our normal water supply has been interrupted.

Their amazing website has a lot of excellent information about Water Storage which will help you get ready in case you lose access to however you normally get fresh water.


Please note: Today is a NEW emergency, none of the limitations listed yesterday apply. Your country is experiencing a WAR and the water purification facility in your area has been bombed. All water services coming to your home have been halted indefinitely. (If you use well water, your well was destroyed too!) Today you will practice living without running water in your home and experience cooking, sanitation, hygiene, etc. with STORED water.
Goal: Learn what your water needs will truly be in an emergency

Today’s Tasks:

• Cook all meals (and CLEAN UP) using only stored water
• Take a shower or bath using stored water (Don’t cheat and skip this one!)
• Use stored water for flushing toilets
• Calculate your usage for the day and use that number to determine how much of a water supply you actually have
• FILL any empty water containers you have been procrastinating on filling
• Make a plan for how you will collect/purify additional water if/when you run out (use your daily report card to help)
• SHARING TIME: Post a picture or a description of the task you found most difficult to do using stored water today on Facebook or in the blog comments.

Today’s Limitations:

• For this day, and ALL days of the challenge: no spending money, no going to stores, and no restaurants
• Do NOT use running water at all. To help you not cheat, you can turn off your main water supply for the day

Advanced Tasks:

• To conserve water, use a sanitation kit rather than flush stored water down the toilet.
• Get ambitious and do a load of LAUNDRY with stored water.
• Go to the nearest source of fresh water and fill up several water containers and purify it.

REMEMBER, TOMORROW’S CHALLENGE WILL BE DIFFERENT.

We have a few 5- and 6-gallon water jugs in the garage. They are empty (ugh!) because we didn't fill them up after we moved them to our new house. And in looking at them, there's not nearly enough to supply our three horses with water. A horse needs 8-10 gallons of water each day. Even if the water jugs were all filled to the top, I'd only have enough water on hand for a day, maybe two!

Our normal water source is a well. It uses an electric pump. If the electricity goes out, I'm up the creek with no paddle. (Although at least the creek would have water!)

An Ohio-based company called Lehmans   offers a Galvanized Well Bucket that's designed to fit into wells as small as 4" inside diameter. It holds 1.9 gal. That might be the solution for us. I should also look into some kind of pulley system on a tripod to make hauling the bucket up a lot easier. And I am going to need a lot of good strong rope, too. The kind of luck I have, our water would be 400 feet down and I'd be standing here with my handy-dandy well bucket and 250 feet of rope!

What are your contingency plans for an extended interruption of your water supply?