Greetings and welcome to the Patriot Express Newsletter Edition #173. It's good to have you with us on this last weekend of July 2022. We appreciate you being here and being a part of HFS. We aren't fancy and we like to talk about southern breakfast foods, chickens, and ways to get prepared. You might even hear a "get er done occasionally.
If you look around, you probably have noticed the merry-go-round we are currently riding on. As the month ends, we can hear sounds of "may day, pay day, or hay day." Many are still confused and not adapting or adjusting to the new America. At this point I must ask, how many voices do you need to hear saying "get prepared" before you start preparing? Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock.... (said in Anthony Hopkins voice from Silence of the Lambs) The border is not a border. Both parties in Washington spend like money is unlimited. Our education system is broken. Food supplies are dwindling. Fuel is overpriced while our government ships our reserves to foreign countries. Want more? The bottom is the government does not respect you nor fear any accountability.
It was a short week here with two days on the road to Huntsville, AL. Can you say hot!!! It was hot and humid in the "Roll Tide" state. Did I hear a few "War Eagle" shouts over that last one? One of the most noticeable things I see each trip to Huntsville is the amount of growth taking place in the Rocket City. Apartment complexes, industrial warehouses, suburbia housing, road expansion, and the list goes on. Anyone looking for a job or needing a job should consider Huntsville as a possible destination. It's a nice place to live.
This week I met up with the HFS HSV family for an evening of breaking bread and talking preparedness. It was great to see the 23 sisters and brothers who could attend. It was nice chatting and hearing about all the great preparedness work being done by families. I try to be upbeat and positive, but it is difficult with all the negative news coming out daily. Reality is important and wearing blinders is going to leave you stranded between a rock and starvation. I appreciate everyone taking time out on a Monday to spend time together.
During our meeting, I posed a question to the group that I will pose to you. You don't have to answer back to me. You need to answer to yourself and be ready to explain to your family why you didn't put back resources. The question posed was this; if the world stops at midnight tonight, can you survive for six months to one year on what you have in your home right now? No more store runs or amazon deliveries. You have what you have. What do you have to lose by stocking food? It's an investment and you can use the food in the future.
On my return trip to East TN, I stopped off in Scottsboro, AL to meet two new HFS Patriots. I welcome them to the HFS family and look forward to working together to help in their preparedness journey. They bring a wealth of preparedness knowledge and skills to the preparedness community.
Later in the week Ms. Lucy and I attended our monthly Bible study group which is always great because several of our HFS family attends the same group. We also got to spend time with another HFS Patriot sister visiting from the Nashville area. It is always a great week when time is spent around fellow Patriots. Life is good indeed.
Please keep Eastern Kentucky and Southwestern Virginia in your prayers as they are currently flooded, some severe, and 15 people lost their life. The Kentucky governor activated the National Guard already. At the time of publishing the PENL all HFS Patriots are safe. We conducted a buddy check yesterday and everyone checked in to the best of our knowledge.
Okay, let us move along.
Thursday Zoom Special Event – There was no Zoom this week. The next Zoom session will be conducted on Thursday, August 4, 2022.
Last Chance to order using the HFS 10% discount. Order by July 31, 2022
Nehemiah Strong - HFS continues to recommend and promote this book because every Christian Preparer should have a copy in their hands.
You can purchase Nehemiah Strong at www.johndyslin.com. John has offered HFS members the discount code HFS1 for a 10% discount through July 31, 2022. Nehemiah Strong would be a great gift for family or friends.
Communications: You can now follow HFS social media on the following outlets:
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Parler - Preparedness101
Check out the HFS YouTube video at the following link. The most recent post is titled Gardening, berry and fruit trees - Lessons Learned posted July 18, 2022 If you have not, please hit subscribe and support our efforts to get the preparedness message out. We would like to see growth on the YouTube Channel platform. Thanks. https://youtu.be/W20Cl_e0bT8
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Guest and Newcomers
If you are a guest or newcomer to the HFS journey, please check out this link for additional
information offered through HFS. https://www.hopeforsurvival.com/post/guest-and-newcomers-information-page
Hope for Survival books and HFS Thumb Drive for Emergency Documents -: You can obtain information on the two HFS books at this link: Survival, Preparedness, Disaster Management for individuals or family (hopeforsurvival.com)
Hope for Survival - How Food, Water, Shelter, and Security Could Save Your Life (Book 1)
Hope for Survival - The Mindset (Book 2)
HFS Thumb Drive for Emergency Documents - We just restocked the HFS Thumb drive and have them available now. Follow this link and you will see the add at the top of the page. Blog | Survival (hopeforsurvival.com)
We must make this brief public announcement to protect the innocent.
Ding, Ding, Ding....Attention HFS readers..... Opinions shared in this newsletter are just that, opinions, and nothing more. Read at your own risk. The owner and author of this site is not responsible for hurt feelings or thin-skinned readers. I do my best to show restraint and respect to the best extent possible. I take as many precautions as possible and try to remain as nonpolitical as possible, however, there are times when I just can't help but point certain things out. Occasionally I use words only Patriots recognize and understand. It's not personal against any non-Patriot. It's just the truth. Sometimes we must pull up our spenders and suck it up. Just saying. Stay the course, read what you want, and avoid the rest. Avoid fear porn as much as possible and the day will be okay. When all else fails… Keep the faith and always have Hope.
Let’s move along and get to some thoughts...
Thoughts for the week - Relax. Pull up a chair and let me share some thoughts with you about my amazing week. If you see a typo or lost comma, forgive me but I'm focused more on telling you the truth.
Fearing the minority - When a person becomes a career politician it is time to self-check the process and rid the system of users, abusers, and those viewing you as incompetent and a dreg of the earth. Think about it, you work, or worked, pay taxes and reinvest in the system to keep other businesses open and functioning. Any elected official, either party, with more than 20 years in a political seat should go. NOW. They are growing accustomed to no accountability to their district or the American people. They need to be OUT now.
If you don't pay taxes you go to jail or get fined all your money, your kids' money, your cat, dog, and even your goldfish. Are you not tired of it? If they don't pay taxes, they are coddled and protected. They verbally or physically abuse another person and their Congressional slush fund pays the fines, lawsuits, and for bounced checks. They are protected. These same abusers of the Constitution, federal law, your rights, and "we the people." are self-indulged bureaucrats and could care less about you, and they are disrespectfully showing it daily.
The federal government is basically saying to you, you no longer own your child and you basically house and feed them only. The public school system and federal system are raping the minds of our children and grandchildren. You basically cannot speak out against a system that is telling your child they can be a boy or girl if they wish, and the parents will have no say in the process. Speak up or speak out and watch what happens to you. I would bet within 72 hours child protective services will be on your doorstep and you will likely lose custody of your child. Little Johnny now has feelings, and you cannot tamper with same. Have you crossed paths yet with a youngster identifying by a pronoun and not a name? A few years ago, the University of Tennessee sent out letters to all the alumni and essential donors stating a new policy for the school year where the school would recognize and support the pronoun identity of students and expected alumni to do the same. Bam. That went over like the Blues brothers in church.
Shortly after the letter was received the backlash was so painful the university rescinded the new policy, and I don't think they have tried it again. Now, don't get me wrong, it remains a very liberal university. But the donors basically told the university where to put their diversity effort or else the donations would dry up. Recently, a Christian friend took their daughter on a tour of Christian colleges and universities, and they encountered the woke crowd during introductions and the brief about the university. I guess the bottom line on this is we are living in a world where pronouns are being proudly used and there should be no confusion of their proper use. Maybe this is all a secret program to help our youth learn proper grammar. Ya think?
So, what am I getting at? I have been beating on the crazy things happening around us and even though everything is basically a personal decision of choice, good or bad, the media carries a lot of faults in the ongoing fiasco around us, but much of the blame rest in Washington D.C. Now I don't want to give too much credit to these yahoos because many of them are followers and not leaders. If you've ever spent much time watching interviews of different elected representatives, you will likely come to the same conclusion. The sad part of this is the level of untruths, hate, racism, and division being spoken to the public.
I heard news this week that the House Sergeant at Arms will make available to each Congress and Senate member up to $10,000 for hardening and upgrading security around their homes. No, this does not include members of the Supreme Court who continue dealing with protest outside their front door. So, Congress and Senate members feel threatened. Really? They tell American citizens they shouldn't have the right to own firearms while standing with taxpayer funded security details. They turn the clamps on "we the people" while writing and passing more laws to take away freedoms and place us under restrictive guidelines. Using words like "you will" and "you must" to strangle us and lock us down in our homes. Last time I checked they work for us. We pay them. I think they have forgotten how this works. They should not have the authority to vote their own pay raises. Are you kidding me? They are pushing us over a cliff with debt and they get a pay raise for mismanaging the nations finances. What kind of deal is that? I know the world and specifically our nation has folks on the streets who wish to cause harm to others. This is more of a psychological problem that our nation's leaders opt to not address when it is easier to attack the 2nd Amendment and restrict law abiding citizens. What are our elected officials who work for us afraid of? House lawmakers to receive $10,000 to bulk up home security (washingtonexaminer.com)
Next ...
Where's the Beef? - Remember the old Wendy's slogan for many years? I don't recall a single point in my life were getting or having access to beef was ever a question or concern. I remember a time when a person could go to a McDonald's and get either four or five burgers for a dollar. Heck, now a quality burger is $7 to $10 bucks. Most major fast-food establishments offer five or more different choices of burgers. Single, double, triple, mushroom and Swiss, bacon, sourdough, jalapeno, and more. Some are better than others and a personal choice of the consumer.
Unlike many countries around the world, we are a nation who can choose beef for their diet and do so as often as they wish. Right? Today, we are seeing, reading, and hearing, more calls to do away with beef to prevent global warming. While Gore, Gates, and the others fill the skies with their privately owned jets burning thousands of gallons of Petro while telling you to stop breathing because you are polluting the air. Shame on you. How could you be so selfish to contribute to global warming.
Over the course of several months the news coming from our nations ranchers and farmers is they can't sustain the rising cost of raising cattle and getting it to market. They are losing financially, and many are sounding the alarm how they are selling off cattle and get out of the business. Many other ranchers in the western and southwestern states had to slaughter thousands of their cattle because of the ongoing severe droughts. We will save the debate over climate control and weather manipulation for another day. The point is our access to beef is decreasing and the prices are getting to a point where not everyone can afford to put beef in their freezer. In my local area I have read advertisements from ranchers stating anyone wishing to purchase fresh beef should sign up soon because they plan to get out of the cattle business in 2022 because of the cost to raise, slaughter, and process, and the added restrictions being placed on them by the FDA and FEDS.
Recently I went for a drive covering a 50-mile radius around my area and I wanted to cross check the news of the beef problems with local farms around me where I know cattle existed in the past. This is part of knowing my five-mile radius and community where I would likely be when things turn south. I took off for the country roads and passed 40-50 farms where I knew cattle once lived. Typically, I would see 500 to 1,000 heads of cattle. On this drive I located 2 cows. That would be 1, 2, heads of cattle on the same farm. Where did all the cattle go so quickly? I don't know. This could be a fluke or an easy explanation. I just don't know what it would be at this point.
I do know that the FDA has been putting a strangle hold on meat processing centers with site visits requesting records of private family purchases and demands to know each family name, how much meat was purchased, and how often a purchase was made. This has closed several processing centers down and other ones opted to close temporarily.
When the cattle are gone and no one is around to process animals, then what? This is why getting it now and knowing how to freeze dry, dehydrate, or pressure can it is important. What is your plan? Don't overlook Claus Schwab's comment about eating bugs and liking it. You may not have noticed but American mainstream print media is now talking about the positives to eating bugs.
Next ...
Have fun and smile, you WILL like it - Going forward in life and hopefully making wise decisions requires a compilation of skills, tools, lessons learned, and blessings. I often think back to my military years where I was blessed to have great supervisors, managers, and commanders. Sometimes when I am doing a task that requires hard work and getting sweaty I hear voices from the past saying, "you will have fun, smile, and like it." I specifically recall hearing the echo of that phrase while digging a latrine trench while living in field conditions. I seriously doubt my brothers and sisters in arms smiled and had fun while pulling sanitation burn pit duty where they spent 8-12 hours burning human feces in the heat of the middle east.
Now that I'm older, slower, and require some fuel additives to keep me moving forward, I think back and chuckle over some things from the military years, but I do try and retain the good lessons. It means working hard and doing your best to enjoy your effort because the alternative of not working hard is not something worth discussing. Doing nothing is failure. Doing something, even if for the first time and/or if you don't know what you are doing it is still something. Read, ask questions, watch YouTube, and do it. Adapt and adjust as you go. What do you have to lose other than time?
Growing up, I had the opportunity to learn gardening from my grandfather. It was boring and the bugs would bite. I had no interest at the time. By the age of 18 I could hardly grow a mustache, much less a garden. It didn't become an interest to me until 2010 when I started noticing the world changing and what appeared to be ahead of us. Festus and I would spend hours upon hours talking the "what ifs" that could happen sooner, than later. We lived in Alabama at the time, and I had access to a plot of garden space for $25 per season. They provided all the water. I had experienced gardeners around me to learn from and I took advantage of it. The challenge was lack of experience, summer heat and humidity, snakes, and clay soil.
I got a plot, tilled the soil, planted my seeds, and watched it go. It was exciting to see the green beans sprout upward first. Then the rest followed suit. I was happier than I pig in slop. Then I started seeing leaves change, plants die, over and under watering, heat, fungus, and four-legged pest. Through three years of gardening, we managed to can lots of green beans, beets, potatoes, and this started building a key part of our food plan going forward. Currently, we enjoy canned green beans and beets remaining from 2014. The key here is I didn't let anything stop or hold me back and I knew I had to be responsible and learn this task. It wasn't about the food availability then. It was learning and knowing if our lives depended on it, I could plant and grow food. This is essential. I will tell you, I'm no master gardener. I simply put my left foot ahead of my right foot and move forward to do it. I'm sharing with you what I have learned along the way.
When folks ask me how much food they need to put back in their food plan, the bottom line is one year. Why so much? Looking at the situation today and planning for the worst case, I'm thinking you need enough food to get you through two growing seasons. This is why I use, teach, and recommend a multi-level food plan. Store bought canned food, dehydrated/freeze dried foods, home canned food, long term storage foods of the dehydrated/freeze dried nature. Then we add the resources you can grow and preserve from your garden. So, why a year minimum? If you can't buy or barter for any foods at all and you are banking on a good garden and it flops, now what? The garden is essential for healthy vegetables and resources to can. You could face a drought, a flood, a natural disaster of sorts, wildlife or bandits raiding your garden, or your inability to grow food. If you haven't had a soil sample or tried to grow a garden and you are banking on luck, you could end up in gardenless and your food stock run out. Now what do you do? How will you explain to your family you have no more food?
Here at HFS we try to be helpful to everyone and be positive in our approach. But, telling someone they are lazy seems negative and disrespectful. Right? But if the truth hurts then it hurts. If it can be used as a wakeup call, then it worked. The point is, it doesn't matter where you live today, if your heart and mind say try to figure out a way to grow something, then do it. A former supervisor used to say "can't, never could do nothing." He was right. I think the way he said it was actually "nuttin" and not nothing. Effort and mindset are key ingredients.
Ms. Lucy teases me when I come in from the garden soaked from sweat and heat, and she says "you could have gone to the air-conditioned grocery store and bought the items." True. But, when the store is gone and nothing is available, then what? I tell her when all the stores are closed and I'm bringing in goodies from the garden I'm not going to share them with her.
The past three years I have shown how to grow a small garden in planters all fitting in the space of a pallet on wheels. Last year I had a couple raised bed boxes to grow in and this year we set up three 16 ft long by 4 ft wide raised boxes. We switched out our process and used decomposing logs as a base with mulch, mushroom compost, and dirt mixed up. We had some varmints early in this growing season, so we chose deer netting around the garden area and then placed bird netting inside the garden area to place over growing vegetables.
Here is a picture of our gifts from God I picked on Sunday:
Three days later
I was out of town and returned home to find these blessings waiting, just three days after picking the gifts in the picture above. Once a tomato gets to a certain size, while green, I go ahead and pick specific types and let them ripen on our screened deck railing. All the tomatoes are from four tomato plants of different types.
To this point we have canned a canner of beets and about 14 pints of pickles. We have also dehydrated tomatoes into a tomato powder and also placed several quart sized bags of tomatoes in the freezer. We will soon be preserving spaghetti squash, green beans, more beets, squash, zucchini, sweet potatoes, potatoes, more tomatoes, and lots of melons to enjoy on the hot evenings.
Some lessons I've learned this year:
Rainwater vs Tap Water - There is a big difference in watering with hose water from the tap vs using rainwater. No comparison at all. We had about seven weeks of no rain at the start of the growing season and the garden was a concern. Tap water wasn't cutting it. I'm in the process of adding another rain barrel near the garden area to feed the vegetables and fruit with rainwater.
Mushroom Compost - Using mushroom compost has been a positive way to go for us. In the beginning of the growing season, I was concerned because our radish and turnip plants started out from seed and broke the surface. Shortly after, they all turned yellow and died. I believe it was caused by the mushroom compost nitrogen level possibly burning them up because I planted them within three weeks of putting in the compost. Interestingly, the spaghetti squash plant located in the same planter box as the turnip/radish is now over 15 feet tall/long.
Plant Personalities - When I first started gardening, I mentally thought of all the plant types being of the same needs. Plant it, water it, and watch it grow. Sorta of like "build it and they will come." Yea well, garden plants are sort of like a family reunion. The plants are all in the garden, but they have different needs once you get past the dirt part. The biggest lesson I continue to learn is the watering process. Different plants require different watering patterns. Some are minimal watering and others more. The most beautiful garden I have ever witnessed is watered according to plant needs and not the gardener's available time. Equally important is watering each plant (once above ground) at the base of the plant. The gardener never pours or squirts water on the leaves or stems, ever.
Red vs Green Tomatoes - You may have noticed all the green tomatoes in the picture above. I would like to say the greens are for fried green tomatoes. Yes, we enjoy battered fried green tomatoes. The reason you see green tomatoes off the vine is to preserve them while they ripen, and we don't lose them for any reason. It happens about this time of the growing season each year. I will go to the garden and find one or more fully developed green tomatoes on the ground. So, to try and get the biggest impact of each plant, I go ahead and pull the developed green tomatoes and then place on the railing of our enclosed deck to fully ripen.
Soured Milk - Nasty huh? Certain plants need and likes lots of calcium. Green bell peppers are a good example. If your home is like ours, we often do not have milk in our fridge and if we do it's because family is visiting. Ms. Lucy may freeze it post-visit or it may be close to the expiration date and start to sour. If this occurs during gardening season you can pour the soured milk around your applicable plants for additional calcium. Good stuff.
Seeds - I often talk about procuring and storing at least two seasons of vegetable seeds. A preparer often buys the long-term seed vaults or long-term seeds in a #10 can. Just to experiment, this year I popped open one of my #10 seed cans that I purchased about 7 years ago. Needless to say, I encountered a growth rate of less than 50% of the seeds used. The sampling is not enough to raise the red flag. I'm just sharing as a caution to be aware of.
As we progress through the gardening season, we watch with excitement as our melons are growing large and fast. It is our first-time planting and growing watermelons. They will come later in the summer. In the meantime, we will soon pick our red pears for the season. The tree is loaded again this year and we must time it right before the bees move in and beat us to the enjoyment of the fruit.
Once I retire from my day job, I will certainly expand the size of our garden to bring in more goodies for canning. Right now, I had to keep it at a manageable size.
I hope you are having a good growing season and prospering from God's blessings. Enjoy.
And that's our thoughts for the week....
Preparedness News –
1. From Kristen Bradley - Milkwood - 7 Climate-Positive Ways To Get Started With Permaculture Living - Milkwood - Here is another opportunity to get educated and use the current weather patterns to your advantage through permaculture.
2. From Tom Marlowe - The Survivalist Blog - Feeding Your Chicks: 15 Things They Can Eat, and 10 Things They Cannot (thesurvivalistblog.net) - Many HFS families currently include chickens in their preparedness planning. Heck, many folks also named their birds and consider them family pets. Rosie, Geraldine, Opie, and Kamala, prance around the farmyard and love on their owners at feed time. Some of them even own a cackling laugh to be separated from the other competitors.
3. From Old World Garden Farms - When To Pick Tomatoes - And The Best Way To Ripen Them! (oldworldgardenfarms.com) - It's growing season and right now we have tomatoes in abundance. Ms. Lucy runs in the other direction every time I come in from the garden. This article provides good information to help determine when to pick your red jewels and then ripen them more if required.
4. From Melissa K. Norris - How to Make Mustard Pickles - Great-Grandma's Recipe - Melissa K. Norris (melissaknorris.com) - Our garden has been very generous this year with perfect sized cucumbers for pickling. It can't be hard to can pickles, right? My first batch is a tad hot and spicy for Ms. Lucy. The recipe called for a small amount of red pepper flakes. Wow. They are warm. I canned the second batch a few days ago and will try them out this weekend. Don't know what to do with your cukes? Try your hand out at pickling them. Good luck!
5. From Laurie Neverman - Common Sense Homes - Pinecone Jam (Tastes Like Pine Cone Honey) (commonsensehome.com) - Here is another recipe to add to your collection. This sure sounds tasty. I don't like giving up a biscuit smothered in sausage gravy, but I will if is covered in a tasty jam or jelly.
Other News -
1. From John Whitehead - The Rutherford Institute - The Rutherford Institute :: Supreme Court Affirms Second Amendment Right of Self-Protection in Public |- Excellent and information from J.W.., as usual. I would bet more than 75% of Americans carrying a firearm outside the home did not stop and learn their rights if challenged or told they are breaking the law.
2. From Isaac Simpson - NC Scout - There's Gonna be a War in Montana - by Isaac Simpson (substack.com) - Good read. Having lived in Montana for five years in my military years I take a personal interest in Montana. This is a good read and based on the authors description of current Montana, it has indeed changed. My life in Montana was relaxing and even with winters at -30 to -60 temps, it was a good place to live. Beautiful landscape, nature, and locals. I moved from Montana to St Louis in 1993 and Montana was just starting to change. Big named Hollywood elite and pro-sport stars started buying up large swaths of land. Crime and all its ingredients followed soon after. Sad to think because Montana was a special place.
3. From Martin Armstrong - Armstrong Economics - Chinese on US Real Estate Spending Spree | Armstrong Economics - Lets play stump the dummy. If China is truly our biggest threat as declared by our nation's highest intelligence service, then why is our government allowing this to happen?
4. From Martin Armstrong and Greg Hunter - Armstrong Economics - Interview: 2023 Will Be the Year from Hell | Armstrong Economics - This is a must. More and more are speaking up and out about forecast and projections for what is ahead economically.
5. From Bradlee Dean - News with Views - Inactions of Franklin Graham Is Why the Enemies of Righteousness are So Encouraged – News With Views - Several months ago on HFS Thursday night zoom we presented some interesting information on the subject of this article. It ruffled a few feathers, but it was simply providing information that presented more questions. I'm not here to convince you one way or the other. I simply give you the information and let you decide on your own.
Drum roll...........
That's all my Patriot brothers and sisters.
Prayers - Please keep our great nation, our elected leaders, military and first responders in your thoughts and prayers. We pray for good health and wisdom. Please pray for our leadership to find answers and guidance to the problems facing our great nation. May your faith remain strong and answers to the unknown provided. God is good and may our prayers blanket and protect you and your circumstances. I pray for each, and every one of our Patriots.
Please pray for our HFS family. We have numerous prayers needed from state to state. I'm sure folks would appreciate it much. A few others are going through different health related issues, both short- and longer-term issues. Please keep our Patriot brother Festus and his family in your prayers and our Patriot brother and his family in northern Alabama also. We all need prayer regardless of circumstances.
May we pray for all the blessings and things in life to be thankful about and continued hope for revival around the world. We must continually pray for the unsaved, our family and friends who live each day without the protection for eternal life and salvation.
As Patriots we must stay strong and never give up. Our home, community, and nation need us now more than ever. Stay focused on your local community and things that will impact you around the nation. Don't allow the events around you to create fear in your life. Build your own self-reliance and focus on faith and hope. Remember we are a blessed nation, and we must continue to be great people today and make a better tomorrow. Keep charging.
Blessings,
Bravo Echo Out,
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