Our Hurricane Experience (Cross-Post)

From our main blog. Back to bargain blogging ASAP...

Our internet just came back up an hour ago along with my parents' power. Our internet is always tied to their power for some reason. It was a long week with no internet.

I should have taken pictures around our neighborhood, but didn't. My mind hasn't been "all there" lately.

Last Thursday, Daniel came home early from work to take down all of our backyard stuff and store it in the garage. Afterward, we went to drop his car off inside my parents garage and picked up some pizzas for dinner.Friday we watched the ocean swell into Galveston and waited for the oncoming storm to start spreading in our direction. It was a long day of waiting. We got some last minute preparations finished. B filled a giant tub with water for me, in case we didn't have water for washing dishes.The girls used their little hook & loom sets that Grammy got them, and we played several games of Sleeping Queens. I made dinner very early in case the power went out. Daniel complained about having dinner at 4:30pm and insisted the power would not be going out until late at night. The power abruptly quit at 6:30pm. The power had not been out for more than an hour when B smashed into J and cut her lip open...

I had all of the kids sleep in my closet so that I didn't have to worry about any windows breaking on them. It was also much quieter in there and less scary. It was like a puzzle fitting a crib, a crib mattress, and 2 twin mattresses in the closet.The storm was extremely loud from 11pm-5am and it was miserably hot inside our house. It was SO loud that I went to sleep on my bathroom floor next to the children in the closet around 11pm. At 2:30 my bathroom ceiling started dripping water and flecks of drywall onto my legs. I spent the rest of the night up and down, and in and out of the garage listening to the car radio. B&J slept fine, L&X were up several times.

We awoke Saturday morning to our fence being mostly down, my hibiscus and Mexican lime tree being somewhat overturned, but that is about all. (the arbor and trampoline base were tethered to the ground with large emergency stakes and bungee cords)

Some of our neighbors lost large portions of their roofs down to the plywood, most fences were down, signs were bent or sheared right off, and many many trees were down. No flooding to speak of around here.
Saturday we cleaned up our yard, visited my parents, and I washed the first of several loads of dishes by hand. We also transferred all of our perishable food into coolers. The water lines were in tact, but not the power. The girls did not enjoy the lack of power, but they made do.

(sweaty baby)

On Sunday, Daniel joined up with some service crews heading out from church and spent most of the day checking on people. It was hot and boring with 4 kids in the house, so I ran an extension cord out to my van, attached it to the power inverter, and ran a movie for the girls to break up the day a little. We did all of our cooking on the grill on Saturday and Sunday.Sunday night, our neighbor was brought a generator and gas from his son-in-law, whose power had returned. He offered to let us plug into it (as it was quite powerful). So, we were able to plug in our refrigerator and a TV...it was great.The temperatures turned cool on Sunday night which improved our experience greatly. The children spent a lot of time outdoors.

On Monday, we unsuccessfully attempted to secure more gas for the generator, got a new post for our fence and some concrete at home depot, etc. Soon after we returned home, our power was restored at 3:30pm. Daniel returned to work on Tuesday morning. The children remain out of school for the remainder of the week.

We have been on limited water consumption due to the risk of our sewers backing up since the pumping station for our area remained without power. My parents' power was restored tonight, Thursday, and with it came our internet...hooray. That is our story...back to our regular blogging schedule tomorrow.