Ike Part 1

I am sure it's only part one....this was a long storm. What do I mean was? We are all still feeling the effects. The girls may go to school on Tuesday. We aren't sure if the school has power or not. It's right across from us, but it's entrance is on another street and possible another electric line.

So, Friday, TD and the girls had the day off and we spent it getting ready. We put everything away outside and put the two Hondas in the garage. We left the truck out. We want to sell it and if a large tree had dropped on it, it just would've made our lives easier. I froze our water gallon jugs one by one and then put them in the fridge to make room for another. That worked out really well. It kept the fridge colder than it would've been when the power went out.

I cleaned out the dressers in our closet and put 3 twin mattresses in there. Big closet, huh? TD ran the air conditioner lower than it normally is, to try and save some cold air in the house. I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to sleep all night because I knew it was going to be loud. However, our closet must be really well insulated because I managed to sleep from 10pm-4am and then fell back asleep before 5am. I got up around 7am and went to survey the damage. Of course our fence fell over. Just two sections, but we were pretty sure some of it was coming down. The neighbor's VERY tall pine tree right next to our garage stayed up, thank heavens. We were probably the luckiest in the cul de sac. There were so many downed trees. One guy had a massive crack in his roof, it looked like it was from a earthquake, not a hurricane.

Apparently the power went off just after 2am. We were lucky to have it for so long. I did have some batteries for the girls' radio and we turned it on to see what we could hear. It's amazing how much we rely on actually seeing things. I was so used to radar maps and satellite pictures that I felt very lost. I had to call my mom and ask her to look up where the hurricane actually was, so that I would know when it was gone. It rained for most of that day.

Oh, for part of my emergency preparedness, I went to the library and picked up the books that were waiting for me. In the last week or so, I have read about 12 books. I don't need TV that much, but I sure miss the internet.

Our block was great. Everyone was out barbecuing the meat from their freezers. I had picked up the stuff for s'mores and I was a big hit with the kids. Our impromptu block party was fun.
This was just Saturday. It was very helpful that the weather stayed relatively not humid and not hot.