My Nut Village

We woke up Friday morning and turned on the TV. They were reporting live from Galveston and we couldn’t believe the size of the waves crashing on the Seawall.  

Here are some before shots of our front and back yards.  The chairs are lined up to be gently tossed into the pool so they don’t get blown around.                                      
                             

Did I say gently tossed?

Here’s a last minute effort to wear the kids out.  At this point the wind is picking up just a bit.  Nothing too wicked. 

We cooked throughout the day and watched the ’round the clock coverage.  The kids played outside until the last possible minute.  We made pizza (Friday is pizza night.  Even during a hurricane) and waited for the power to go out.  It did.  We lost power at about 8:45.  The kids were hanging upstairs and freaked!  I met them at the stairs with flashlights.  Everyone had their own.  I lit some candles and we settled everyone in the laundry room.  There is one small window that we boarded up and we filled the room with blankets and pillows.  Our oldest had her iPod and the others listened to audio books.  It worked like a charm.  They were all asleep before the first strong gust!  They rested comfortably until about 3:00 am.  At that point we were having sustained winds of about 35-40 mph. (Our guess)  Gusts possibly up to 75 mph. (Again, a guess)  Thankfully, not the 100-110 mph we were expecting.  We went out just for a minute into our screen room.  All we could see were the trees swaying wildly.  And then something (we think a transformer) blew.  Like exploded.  It moaned like the monster on LOST.  I swear.  It lit up the sky and I. was. outta. there.  When we got inside, we giggled at how silly we were and then everyone went back to sleep.  So, all in all, for us it was just a really long, strong Spring storm.  We feel really blessed to have come through it without any major issues.  unlike so many.  My heart breaks for those closer to the coast and those East of us that are still suffering without power and water.  Here are some after shots…

Lots and lots of leaves. 

Small branches here and there.

And we lost part of our fence.  I feel we were lucky that we had the big grapevine to hold the fence together.  The fence seemed to just lay down under it’s weight.  That woulda been a pain to dig outta the pool.  Our neighbor helped us kinda prop it back up with wood and stuff until we can replace it.  (It really was more involved than “wood and stuff”.  I just can’t be bothered with the jobs of the menfolk.)  It’s safe and stable.  Please don’t call CPS. 

So, there you go!  We made it.  We’re safe.  We’re thankful.