However we were extremely blessed--our house is OK and suffered no damage-we are OK and Alex's family is all OK and our cars are OK! AND we FINALLY got power back on Saturday night (after 8 days without it). And fortunately it has stayed on. We were also extremely lucky that a cool front came through and made Houston in September bearable without our precious A.C. Miracle of all miracles! Unfortunately a lot of people have it a lot worse than we do and there is still a lot of clean up to do! One of the biggest challenges was trying to find ice after the storm since no businesses were open and FEMA took a couple days to get settled. We actually only had to go to a FEMA 'POD' (point of distribution) once for ice and were lucky enough to get it elsewhere or our good friends/neighbors helped keep us supplied. The other big challenge was trying to keep a 2 year old entertained! That was interesting. But all in all Ethan was a trooper and did great!
Here are some pictures of our 'hood after the hurricane-I heard that we had 110 mph winds in our area and considering all the trees that snapped or just gave up (like ours) I believe it. At one point at about 4:30AM on Friday night/Saturday morning I could feel the second floor of our house shaking just slightly from the wind. That was a little scary. I slept for about an hour and a half that night. Fortunately Ethan slept through the WHOLE thing even with the rain pounding against his window-Amazing!
Here's a couple pictures of our poor little pine tree in our front yard. It was about 18-20 ft. tall and we are so glad that it just laid down and gave up the fight instead of falling onto our house. The picture above was taken a couple days after the storm (notice the beautiful blue sky). The next few pictures were taken on Saturday, after the majority of the hurricane passed.
During the night of the hurricane I kept looking out the window at our little tree and watched it get closer and closer to the ground. At one point I thought it had blown away cuz I couldn't see it laying on the ground because of the rain and wind and darkness. But it stayed put.
Here's one of the streets in our neighborhood, we had about 10 or 12 huge pine trees down-just in our little neighborhood alone. Amazingly none fell onto houses-most of them just fell into the street or into yards. We drove around on Saturday after the storm and I don't think there was a neighborhood in our area that didn't have downed trees. Some were on houses, some were on the road that made it impossible to pass, some were on the power lines and cars, some seemed as if nothing had happened at all. Houston and surrounding areas are heavily wooded and that was big part of the problem with getting the power back on, trying to clear all the trees from the power lines was quite a task apparently. Good reason for underground power lines-huh?
Here's a picture of Ike on TV when we still had power-it was huge and coming right for us-YIKES!!
I guess I'm a true Texan now having survived 2 hurricanes, the first was Rita 3 years ago-which we evacuated to Lufkin for and it ended up hitting Lufkin worse than it hit Houston. Plus it took us 13 hours to get there and it's normally an hour and a half drive. I think that is a big part of why we decided to stay and ride this hurricane out, we didn't want to sit in traffic for hours and hours with all the other evacuees. And we felt like we were well prepared for the storm with flashlights, candles, battery operated radio, a full tank of gas and lots of non perishable food, plus we have a gas stove and water heater so we could still shower and cook on the stove. Had we known the power was going to be out for a week we may have changed our minds, but honestly it wasn't THAT terrible without power-it was doable. I'm just grateful I can run my dishwasher now and turn on the garbage disposal and do laundry (don't laugh family-it's true) and flip a switch and have light. And I still have a home that is perfectly safe and sound. Nothin' like a hurricane to put things in perspective for you!
7 comments:
All y'all deserve the super trooper prize for sticking it out without power for 8 whole days! Now you never have to do the pioneer trek because you've already lived it! I think if there is one more hurricane, you should just pack your bags and move to Utah! (OK...that's for selfish reasons, but seriously! 2 hurricanes is enough!)
Nice pictures! I just updated my blog... with many more pictures coming! 8 days without power... at least it's better then 9 days! ha ha ha, I am still laughing about it!
Glad to hear you came through it without any major damage. I lost two trees, but like your little pine, they just gave up and laid down instead of falling on the house like so many others did. Glad you finally got power back. One of my co-workers still doesn't. I can't even imagine. We got ours back pretty quickly.
I am glad you survived! Next time make the trek up to Dallas and we will keep you company! You are welcome at the Kneeland pad any time!
You are a trooper. I am so glad your family and home all made it through! Wow, I can't believe you slept even an hour and a half! I would have been freaking out all night! Like I said, you are a trooper!
wow. i was complaining today that it was too hot in vegas. i feel like a wuss. you guys are amazing! sounds like it was quite a ride and your house was blessed!!
So glad your house is okay. We lost our fence and it's almost $4K to replace it. Ugh! I'm tired of paying for a place where we don't live anymore. But I'm grateful it's not worse.
I'm glad you liked the blanket and shoes. Your note was super sweet.
I bought David a panini make for his birthday. We're addicted ever since Alex made them for us!
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