I fully agree with your approach Bacpacjac. I approached the subject of keeping it over at her place and even tried it once before. It turned into a travesty. When I was going through my BOB's (wife's and mine) I called to get his and update it with larger clothes and make sure all the food was still edible (no mold, holes in packaging etc.). They were unable to find any of the contents other then the sleeping bag, the pack, and part of a flashlight. When I asked as delicately as I could what happened to all the equipment, her responce was "OOOhhh, I don't know, its around here somewhere..." Hence, the new BOB is kept at my place as having equipment scattered in places unknown is as good as not having it at all.

My son understands the purpose of it and I also encourage him "messing with the stuff" to become familiar with all of it. Afterward he is very peticular on packing it the way it was and putting it away. His mother on the other hand, thinks it is a silly waste of money and *not quoting here* GOD and the government will take care of us should we have a disaster... OMG! Well at least you all know one of the reasons why we split ways.

Back to the discussion at hand, I agree with your phylosophy when it comes to kids and preparedness and not talking disasters, but prepared to stay safe and well.

In fairness to the Globe & Mail: I think they found an "expert" with a contrary point of view just to provide some obligatory balance. Overall, the article was entirely fair and reasonable in terms of people making preparations.

I also think kids gain confidence from preparations, especially if they are included in some way. You can't really isolate children from reality; they figure it out. But you can help them deal with it. Think of the original Grimm's fairy tales (no Disney there).

A lot of the comments seem to be people wondering why they would need to prepare for such things.