What do you stock up on for winter (if you do)? When do you start stocking?

[Saddlemomma]

We start getting ready for winter as soon as spring hits.  Our gardens get planned, and I start planting all cold weather tolerant crops as soon as the ground thaws. Sometimes that means with snow still on the ground. I start most of our veggies in a cold-frame and transplant as the weather becomes accommodating.  We have three, 60' x 40' gardens.  We grow almost all of our own veggies.  The rest of the summer and into fall is maintaining and harvesting the gardens, fruit trees, & berries; then we preserve the produce by freezing, dehydrating, and making jams, jellies, etc. This constitutes the bulk of our fruit and veggies over the winter.  The only thing I end up buying at the grocery store is broccoli because I can't stand dealing with the cabbage loopers hiding in the broccoli.  Nothing ever really gets them all unless you're willing to use commercial pesticides in your garden.  I'm not willing to pollute our gardens, so I buy it and wash thoroughly. That way, the rest of our veggies are pesticide free.

 

• We usually have a load of tree-length logs sitting in the yard from the fall beforehand.  As soon as spring hits, DH cuts those down to 18"-20" logs. Then together we split those and toss them down into one of the six bins (58' x 11') of our huge barn.  Once the wood is all split, we stack what is in the barn along the walls of that bin. Since the floor of the barn is concrete, the wood is stacked on pallets.  This way, every 3 days we can fill up the bucket of the tractor right in the barn and drive it up to the house deck and unload it for the woodstove.
• DH also cuts down one cedar tree and trims that up for kindling for the year.
• DH cleans the chimney (which, ironically, he's doing right now, to prepare for our first fire of the season).  It's been getting cold here in the evenings for the past couple of weeks.
• Every other year we raise two pigs.  This happens to be one of those years.  This fall, before steady freezing temps, we'll slaughter the pigs, butcher them and fill our freezer.  We do all the work ourselves.
• I've also just made 4 lbs. of soap to get us through the winter.  It's curing in the upper part of our barn and will be reading in two months.
• Berry plants and asparagus will need to be put to bed using straw.  Since the farmer who leases some of our fields just baled some straw (hugh round bales), DH just took our tractor out and collected two bales for this purpose.  It will also be utilized for additional bedding for the pigs until slaughter time.
• The potatoes in our fields will be harvested within the next couple weeks.  As soon as that is done, we will take the tractor to the fields and gleen potatoes for our winter/spring stores.
• Root cellar will be cleared out and ready for this year's potatoes, onions, carrots, and beets
• We have made the appointment to get our furnace (back-up heat source) cleaned and ready for use.  DH also started up our generator and let it run yesterday a to make sure it runs soundly in case we need it.
• Chickens will have their flexible fencing taken down and we will severly curtail their huge yard with chicken wire before we get too much snow.  We will need to get their water heater in place as well.
• DH will dig in flexible fiberglass reflexive posts lining our driveway and roadway down to the barn so he can snowblow with the tractor.
• We will pick up any larger rocks/stones from those roadways so they don't break a shearpin in the snowblower.
• DH will put chains on the tractor tires as soon as the ground freezes.
• Switch clothes from summer to winter (this means a trip to the attic).
• Drain & store the two riding lawn mowers, weedwhacker, log-splitter, hand rototillers; grease & load summer tractor equipment into middle barns; get snowblower greased & ready to use; get XC skiis & snowshoes ready & accessible in the well-house.

I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of other miscellaneous things we do to get ready for winter, but it's just so routine after 20 years in VT and now 10 in ME, that it just gets to be a habit and second nature.

 

 

[Saddlemomma]

Rock salt is about it. Our winters are hit or miss, usually a couple of ice storms and cold, snow can be a lot or a little. 

 

 

We use the wood ashes from our wood stove.  They work really well.  Sometimes we will go to the town garage and get pails of salt if we get an ice storm.

[Ali in OR]

I like to stay pretty well-stocked year round on the basics. Summer I slack off a little, but starting in October or so (when the grocery stores have stock-up prices on baking/holiday/wintery food) I begin to take it more seriously. Stuff I stock:

 

-chocolate chips for the year are bought at holiday sale prices starting late October. Same with some spices, chicken broth, parchment paper, etc.

-I buy honey and grass-fed beef before the farmer's market goes on hiatus from late November to late January

-I pick a year's worth of blueberries in July and freeze them

-buy vitamin C lozenges, vitamin D, and kleenex before the colds hit.

-pay attention to weather and make sure we have milk and everything else before snow or icy weather

[Saddlemomma]

I don't really stock up, but one thing I don't want to be without is drain cleaner, just in case. And lightbulbs.

 

Drain cleaner is a new one for me.  I literally never think about it.  If a drain gets plugged I use the plunger or DH takes the drain apart. However, I can relate to lightbulbs.  DH seems obsessed with them.  I always have to drag him away from that aisle in whatever store carries them. It's maddening  :toetap05:

[Bambam]

We are Texas, so I generally don't stock up for winter. But, if there is even the threat of snow or ice, people seriously panic here.

 

But, I do stock up for Christmas because I do not like going to the store after Thanksgiving until the new year starts. I have to go for milk, eggs, and produce, but I try to limit my shopping to that. 

 

I make sure I have enough toilet paper, kleenex, chicken, frozen vegetables, bread (freeze a loaf or two, we don't eat much), frozen fruit (smoothies), vitamins, elderberry syrup, and anything else I can think of.

 

 

[Saddlemomma]

Ooh!  I forgot.  One of the things I must do before winter is go to the Amish store about 45 mins. away.  I get all my bulk herbs and spices there.  We also get a huge tub of coconut oil, dried chicken and beef stock for soups and stews, and a 50# bag of golden wheat berries to replenish our stores.  Now that we have a grain mill, we grind all our own flour as we need it.  It's so much better than store-bought flour because it retains the germ and hull (for fiber) which helps mitigate the effects of gluten.

[Artichoke]

The only thing I try to make sure I have on hand is Elderberry syrup and other cold/flu stuff - tissues, throat lozenges, etc. I go with the iron clad logic of if I have cold/flu supplies in the house, no one will get sick and need them.  :lol:

 

 

I stock up on these too whenever they go on sale at the drugstore and use coupons when I can.   We make elderberry syrup so I make sure to have elderberries on hand.  

 

The fall is when we also purchase a quarter of beef.

[Alessandra]

Drain cleaner is a new one for me. I literally never think about it. If a drain gets plugged I use the plunger or DH takes the drain apart. However, I can relate to lightbulbs. DH seems obsessed with them. I always have to drag him away from that aisle in whatever store carries them. It's maddening :toetap05:

I never thought about it until I was in the middle of cooking Thanksgiving dinner one year... clogged drain that plunger did not work on.

[Shellydon]

Nothing, we don't have winter here

[bluemongoose]

Second half of list. Had to stop before I was done typing last time  :001_smile:

 

Paper/bathroom items: TP, Tissues, soaps, toothpaste, shampoo etc.

 

Bottled water

 

Meds: EmergenC, benedryl, epipens, advil

 

Stock the freezer: fish, veggies, bacon, fruit, cheese, butter

 

Pantry: pasta, spices, dried fruit, other grains/items not bought in 25 lb bulk amounts

 

Safety: lighters, flashlights, batteries, gas for generator

 

For the chickens: put their water heater in 

 

Stock the cars with chains, warm hats, coats, gloves

 

We don't get a lot of snow here, we get ice. It is also very hilly. Ice and hills are not a good combo. 

 

Last winter we were snowed/iced in completely the week after Christmas-near the end of Jan. Even deliveries didn't attempt our street. That was a long time! We make sure we can make it fine if we cannot get out.

Edited September 5, 2017 by bluemongoose

[Saddlemomma]

The only thing I try to make sure I have on hand is Elderberry syrup and other cold/flu stuff - tissues, throat lozenges, etc. I go with the iron clad logic of if I have cold/flu supplies in the house, no one will get sick and need them.  :lol:

 

I'll be going to a farm to pick elderberries sometime this month too.  I went to the same place last month and picked a winter's worth of blueberries because our bushes don't do very well.  I think I need to feed them some acid....however, we did pick 75 quarts of strawberries from our own plants, so we have plenty of those.  In fact, we're a little sick of strawberries at the moment.  :thumbup1:

[Alessandra]

We start getting ready for winter as soon as spring hits. Our gardens get planned, and I start planting all cold weather tolerant crops as soon as the ground thaws. Sometimes that means with snow still on the ground. I start most of our veggies in a cold-frame and transplant as the weather becomes accommodating. We have three, 60' x 40' gardens. We grow almost all of our own veggies. The rest of the summer and into fall is maintaining and harvesting the gardens, fruit trees, & berries; then we preserve the produce by freezing, dehydrating, and making jams, jellies, etc. This constitutes the bulk of our fruit and veggies over the winter. The only thing I end up buying at the grocery store is broccoli because I can't stand dealing with the cabbage loopers hiding in the broccoli. Nothing ever really gets them all unless you're willing to use commercial pesticides in your garden. I'm not willing to pollute our gardens, so I buy it and wash thoroughly. That way, the rest of our veggies are pesticide free.

 

• We usually have a load of tree-length logs sitting in the yard from the fall beforehand. As soon as spring hits, DH cuts those down to 18"-20" logs. Then together we split those and toss them down into one of the six bins (58' x 11') of our huge barn. Once the wood is all split, we stack what is in the barn along the walls of that bin. Since the floor of the barn is concrete, the wood is stacked on pallets. This way, every 3 days we can fill up the bucket of the tractor right in the barn and drive it up to the house deck and unload it for the woodstove.
• DH also cuts down one cedar tree and trims that up for kindling for the year.
• DH cleans the chimney (which, ironically, he's doing right now, to prepare for our first fire of the season). It's been getting cold here in the evenings for the past couple of weeks.
• Every other year we raise two pigs. This happens to be one of those years. This fall, before steady freezing temps, we'll slaughter the pigs, butcher them and fill our freezer. We do all the work ourselves.
• I've also just made 4 lbs. of soap to get us through the winter. It's curing in the upper part of our barn and will be reading in two months.
• Berry plants and asparagus will need to be put to bed using straw. Since the farmer who leases some of our fields just baled some straw (hugh round bales), DH just took our tractor out and collected two bales for this purpose. It will also be utilized for additional bedding for the pigs until slaughter time.
• The potatoes in our fields will be harvested within the next couple weeks. As soon as that is done, we will take the tractor to the fields and gleen potatoes for our winter/spring stores.
• Root cellar will be cleared out and ready for this year's potatoes, onions, carrots, and beets
• We have made the appointment to get our furnace (back-up heat source) cleaned and ready for use. DH also started up our generator and let it run yesterday a to make sure it runs soundly in case we need it.
• Chickens will have their flexible fencing taken down and we will severly curtail their huge yard with chicken wire before we get too much snow. We will need to get their water heater in place as well.
• DH will dig in flexible fiberglass reflexive posts lining our driveway and roadway down to the barn so he can snowblow with the tractor.
• We will pick up any larger rocks/stones from those roadways so they don't break a shearpin in the snowblower.
• DH will put chains on the tractor tires as soon as the ground freezes.
• Switch clothes from summer to winter (this means a trip to the attic).
• Drain & store the two riding lawn mowers, weedwhacker, log-splitter, hand rototillers; grease & load summer tractor equipment into middle barns; get snowblower greased & ready to use; get XC skiis & snowshoes ready & accessible in the well-house.

I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of other miscellaneous things we do to get ready for winter, but it's just so routine after 20 years in VT and now 10 in ME, that it just gets to be a habit and second nature.

I am mpressed!

[Tammi K]

The only thing we 'stock up' on is gas for the emergency generator.  We try to keep about 25 gallons on hand to get us through any lon power outages.

 

Otherwise, life just goes on as normal here no matter the weather.

[MEmama]

The only thing we 'stock up' on is gas for the emergency generator. We try to keep about 25 gallons on hand to get us through any lon power outages.

 

Otherwise, life just goes on as normal here no matter the weather.

Can I ask how you store that much gas? I'm reluctant to get a generator because I'm not sure how to properly store the fuel, and how to use it after winter (we don't have gas powered tools or lawnmower). I'd like a small generator in theory so we can run our pellet stove in an emergency, but the gas storage freaks me out.

[athomeontheprairie]

We are quite rural. It's a long way to town, and of the snow is bad it may be several days before the roads get cleared.

 

I stock up on things we need for sickness. Medications to bring down fever, ginger ale, supplies for chicken noodle soup, saltines, tp.

Everything else is normal. But I'm not chancing not being able to get to town when/if the kids are sick.

[jjeepa]

Do you get clogs often?!  I would never have thought of that!  Do you use it for maintenance or just when it clogs?  I'm totally curious.  lol

 

Our upstairs shower runs slows and my dh has been planning to take it all apart and replace plumbing for about 3 years now  :closedeyes:  So, yeah, I keep it around and use it pretty often.  Also, it never fails to get really bad when dh is out of town.  He travels once a month so I stay prepared.  

[madteaparty]

We use the wood ashes from our wood stove. They work really well. Sometimes we will go to the town garage and get pails of salt if we get an ice storm.

They do? I never heard this! It would be great news here

[madteaparty]

Can I ask how you store that much gas? I'm reluctant to get a generator because I'm not sure how to properly store the fuel, and how to use it after winter (we don't have gas powered tools or lawnmower). I'd like a small generator in theory so we can run our pellet stove in an emergency, but the gas storage freaks me out.

Our generator sits next to the propane tank. Which is huge, but even so, running the generator for 4 days straight would exhaust it

[MEmama]

Our generator sits next to the propane tank. Which is huge, but even so, running the generator for 4 days straight would exhaust it

We got rid of our propane tank when we switched to natural gas (it was for our kitchen stove). The main argument for a small generator for us is to keep the house from freezing (no need for it other than in winter). I do wonder how much gas would be useful to have on hand, given that we'd only use it if the outage was long term.

[madteaparty]

We got rid of our propane tank when we switched to natural gas (it was for our kitchen stove). The main argument for a small generator for us is to keep the house from freezing (no need for it other than in winter). I do wonder how much gas would be useful to have on hand, given that we'd only use it if the outage was long term.

Really the only thing we'd need the generator for is the deep freezer full of food. We have a wood stove for heat.

ETA that I didn't buy this generator--it came with the house

Edited September 6, 2017 by madteaparty

[Pawz4me]

I do wonder how much gas would be useful to have on hand, given that we'd only use it if the outage was long term.

 

The specs for most generators should tell you about how much fuel it would take to run it under full load per hour. Our previous RV had a 7500 watt Generac and it supposedly consumed about half a gallon of fuel per hour under full load. We never tested it, so I can't say how accurate it was. But all of them should give you some ball park estimate.

[Saddlemomma]

They do? I never heard this! It would be great news here

 

Yes, really they do. Even when the ashes are cold, they are so fine they stick right to the ice.  We only use salt with severe ice storms. Most of the time it's too cold in our area for salt to work, even during the rare times when the sun is shining brightly, the constant northwesterly winter winds keep the temps in the negative 20-30+ below range.  Therefore, we save all our ashes in a large trash can in our well-house.  Then DH and I can shovel-scatter it onto the driveway directly as needed and/or dump some into a wheelbarrow for the driveway to the barn.

[Saddlemomma]

The only thing we 'stock up' on is gas for the emergency generator.  We try to keep about 25 gallons on hand to get us through any lon power outages.

 

Otherwise, life just goes on as normal here no matter the weather.

  

Do you add a gas stabilizer to your stored gasoline?  If you don't, the Ethanol that is added to gasoline will separate over time which creates bad fuel that is detrimental to your engines. This may cause your engines to not operate correctly.  

[Tammi K]

Can I ask how you store that much gas? I'm reluctant to get a generator because I'm not sure how to properly store the fuel, and how to use it after winter (we don't have gas powered tools or lawnmower). I'd like a small generator in theory so we can run our pellet stove in an emergency, but the gas storage freaks me out.

The generator sits under the back deck but we store the cans of gas in a separate shed detached from the house.  It only house a few yard tools so it generally sits undisturbed.

 

 

 

Do you add a gas stabilizer to your stored gasoline?  If you don't, the Ethanol that is added to gasoline will separate over time which creates bad fuel that is detrimental to your engines. This may cause your engines to not operate correctly.  

We rotate the gas frequently.  We use it to put a few gallons in a car if it's getting low. Then we refill the can. 

 

We also switch over to generator power and run the generator for about an hour every 6 months.  DH makes one of the kids do it so we are all proficient.