Hurricane Ike
It looks like things are starting to get back to normal around here. We got our power back around noon yesterday and it hasn't gone back down again so we are hopeful that this time it will stay on for good.
Last Friday, the night of the storm (which happened to be Andy's birthday) the kids slept in the closet under the stairs and Andy and I slept in the pantry. I slept fairly well until 1:45 AM when a loud noise woke me up. The winds outside were fierce and even from downstairs I could hear things falling on the roof of the house. Some of the "thunks" were so loud that I thought we would wake up to holes in the roof. I thought we would get lucky with the power because even after hours of strong winds we still had power but at 6:15 AM the electricity finally went out. The strong wind and rain continued throughout most of Saturday. The kids stayed downstairs and each time I ventured upstairs I would get spooked when another branch fell on the roof and I would go running to the pantry again. Toward the end of Saturday the rain finally stopped and we walked outside to assess the damage. We were surprised, but incredibly relieved, to see that we had no damage. We just had a yard littered with branches and other debris.
The front yard before the storm.
The kids in their safe zone.
Sunday and Monday were spent cleaning our yard and helping neighbors clean their yards. We transfered the ice that we had bagged and all our refrigerated food into coolers and ate the perishable food first. By Tuesday I had to go in search of ice. It was pretty scary since the traffic lights weren't working and not everyone seemed to understand or care about the 4-way stop principle when lights aren't operational.
The front yard after the storm.
Adrian at the corner of our house with some neighbors.
Morgan and Alyssa playing the in the next-door neighbor's yard.
I made it to HEB by 7:45 AM and there was already a really long line of people waiting for the doors to open. A sheriff came by and announced that they were going to make two lines. One was for ice only, 5 bag maximum, $2 each, cash only. The other line was going to be for non-perishable food only and they were going to allow 20 people at a time into the store. Nearly everyone made a break for the ice only line and I was no exception. I had hoped to get some food too but after I was finished with the ice line the food line was so long that I had to get the ice home so it wouldn't melt. I went to another HEB store later that afternoon and was able to get some bread, pasta, chips, trail mix, apples, and bananas. Most of the store was blocked off and the shelves were pretty bare. They had no perishable food and very little produce. It was surreal to be walking around the dimly lit store with only a limited number of other patrons in there trying to pick through and find food for the next few days. I came very close to packing up the kids and driving to Alabama. I really wanted to take advantage of the schools being closed to make a visit to Mom and Dad but at the same time I wanted to stay put and enjoy the newfound closeness of the neighborhood. Besides, it was kind of nice to not have the kids glued to the TV or computer. We played outside a lot, played card games, and went for walks.
We were incredibly fortunate to have water and natural gas. Luckily our hot water heater is hooked up to natural gas. Also we recently got a new grill with a side burner and had it hooked up to a natural gas line so we cooked all our meals outside. We were also very lucky that the weather cooled off after the first couple of days and we didn't need the air conditioner anyway. If the weather had not cooled off I'm pretty sure we would have all packed up and driven to Alabama.
posted by Klein Family @ 9/19/2008 07:55:00 AM
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