Blackout Kits

The most common issue we deal with is power outages. Sometimes they happen as a result of a bigger emergency, and sometimes they just happen on their own. A power outage during the day is fairly benign; a mild annoyance at the worst, but a seemingly comical event at the same time as you watch your kids enter panic mode because the WiFi no longer works and they don't know how to handle such an emergency. I almost welcome these periodic outages. I love telling the kids, "Welcome to my childhood." But a power outage after dark is a little more stressful as we all inevitably scramble to find one or two operable flashlights. Do you know where your flashlights are? Do they have batteries? Are the batteries still good? This is not the time to be looking for flashlights, and then find out the batteries are from the 1989. Know where your lights are before you need them. 

This module is a really easy one to put together. Let's get your flashlights in a common place right now so you know where they are when you need them. Sure, I have a few lights that circulate around the house, lights that we commonly use for everyday projects. Their locations can usually be guessed, such as in the tool box, in a cupboard, or on a night stand somewhere. But I keep all of our additional lights, such as extra flashlights, headlamps, candles, glow sticks, etc. in their own bin and I store this bin in a location that my whole family knows about (in our case, it is our hall closet). I refer to this bin as our "Blackout kit," and it is the first thing we grab following a power outage. I do NOT keep these lights in a "Ready" state, which is to say, I do not keep batteries installed in them. These lights may go unused for a long time, and I just don't need a bin full of flashlights with dead batteries. Even when off, flashlights (or any devices) will produce an ever slight draw on the battery, eventually depleting the batteries completely. And once a battery is completely depleted, it runs the risk of leaking, corroding, and damaging the device it is installed in. So, while I do not keep batteries installed in these lights, I do keep a fresh supply of batteries in the bin, ready to go when needed. And I make sure I have enough batteries to supply each light with at least 2 rounds of batteries. I personally keep a Costco package of batteries in this bin, and whenever our house supply runs low, we grab this package and replace it with a brand new package the next time we go to Costco. This way, we know our "Blackout Kit" batteries are always good to go.