a very windy night

August 31, 2011 at 12:32 pm (for the record)

“Oh the wind is lashing lustily, and the trees are thrashing thrustily,
And the leaves are rustling gustily, so it’s rather safe to say. . .
that it looks like a rather blustery day today “

-Winnie the Pooh

So we survived the earthquake, and a few days later, hurricane Irene came by for a visit. . . two natural disasters in one week (I’m just waiting for someone to discover a new volcano at the end of our block – or the end of the world)!

We knew it was coming, and did our best to wind-proof the backyard. All of the  smaller kiddy toys were brought into the basement, and the rest of them were unceremoniously stuffed into the playhouse. . . um, yeah. We have a LOT of kiddy toys.

It was a long and noisy night – the worst bit came between midnight and four in the morning. Husby was  sick with a cold, and so was lucky enough to sleep fairly soundly with a hefty dose of Nyquil in him, while I patrolled the house restlessly with the dogs.

It was humid and muggy in the house without the benefit of electricity and air conditioning, and the noise of the storm woke T from her sleep. We eventually cracked the windows to let some air (and a lot more noise) in. Teagle spent much of the night keeping me company with her Tinkerbell flashlight, but eventually we were both able to get a few hours of sleep. Rowan seems to be turning into the world’s most amazing sleeper, and didn’t make a peep all night long. Thank God, because I don’t know how I would have kept her happy in the dark and noisy storm without help from DJ Lance Rock!

The morning dawned sunny and breezy – a beautiful day to clean up the mess that Irene left in her wake. The girls were perfectly happy to ‘help’ me in putting our yard back the way it’s supposed to be.

We were very blessed, the giant trees in our back yard stayed put. Sticks and branches littered our yard, but no actual damage was done. The power was out in our neighborhood until late the next evening (and the internet took an additional day to come back up), but many in the state have been without electricity for days. . .

We ended up with four giant contractor bags full of debris from the trees, but that was quickly taken care of, and life returned to normal.

Several days later, the sound of chainsaws fills the air, and a walk through our neighborhood shows us how lucky we were. Fallen trees are everywhere – in yards, on houses and cars, and some roads are still closed until they can be cleared away. Many people are dealing with flooded basements and ruined roofs. I thank God for watching over me and my little family so faithfully and always keeping us safe!