Safe & Sound

Hello!

Since our land line is out, and cell reception is spotty at best, we have established this blog to keep family and friends informed of our health and welfare. Text or email seems to be the best way to reach us. (We have wonderful friends with power that are letting us bunk with them and use their internet!)

Just to let you know we are all safe and sound following Hurricane Ike. We were blessed in that we suffered no real damage or injury. Here is an account of what has happened over the last few days...

We boarded up on Thursday, 9/11/08 and helped the neighbors make sure they were ready as well. Greg's mom was under mandatory evacuation on Friday, 9/12/08 and came to stay with us for the duration. We hunkered down on and waited out the storm. We were able to follow the progress of the storm on TV until 7:30 PM when we lost power. After that, we had to get our info from the battery operated radio. We now have a definite appreciation for what the folks in England during WWII went through. The winds came first, and slowly built to hurricane force before we ever saw a drop of rain. The rain started late in the evening and continued throughout the night. Kids slept through most of it. The first part of the storm was bad, but the second part was worse - which is unusual for a hurricane. About 2 AM on Saturday morning, 9/13/08, our youngest appeared bedside to inform us his ceiling was leaking...on Maw-Maw. We got up to clean it up, find a bucket to catch the drips, and set up alternate sleeping arrangements. Meanwhile, the eye of the storm (giant eye) passed right over us, so we had 2 hours of calm before the second half of the storm. During the eye, Greg ventured out to assess damage in the neighborhood and help secure limbs and downed fences. About noon on Saturday, the rains and winds began to let up and we were able to truly assess our situation. We had lots of debris from the neighbors' trees, roof ventilators, shingles, and a variety of other projectiles that had landed in our yard. There was also a very tired dove that was sitting near the side of the house. We did not find any structural, fence, nor roof damage. Shea's trampoline wasn't so fortunate, as we found it straddling the back fence after the storm. It also took out Greg's lemon tree that he and the kids grew from a seed from a slice of lemon in a glass of tea. It had just started to produce fruit. (I guess they'll have to start over again!)

We are about to have dinner, so we will post more this evening.

If you want to see pictures, here is a link to the news station we watch/listen to: http://www.khou.com/

God Bless!

Courtney