What we learned during Hurricane Ike...

I know I know still talking about hurricane Ike but I thought this was funny and yet true in so many ways when I got it from a friend:

1. Coffee and frozen pizzas can be made on a BBQ grill.
2. No matter how many times you flick the switch, lights don't work without electricity.
3. My car gets 23.21675 miles per gallon, EXACTLY (you can ask the people in line who helped me push it).
4. Kids can survive 4 days or longer without a video game controller in their hand.
5. Cats are even more irritating without power!
6. He who has the biggest generator wins.
7. Women can actually survive without doing their hair- you just wish they weren't around you.
8. A new method of non-lethal torture- showers without hot water.
9. There are a lot more stars in the sky than most people thought.
10. TV is an addiction and the withdrawal symptoms are painful.
11. A 7 lb bag of ice will chill 6-12 oz Budweiser's to a drinkable temperature in 11 minutes, and still keep a 14 lb. turkey frozen for 8 more hours.
12. There are a lot of dang trees around here.
13. Flood plan drawings on some mortgage documents were seriously wrong.
14. Aluminum siding, while aesthetically pleasing, is definitely not required.
15. Crickets can increase their volume to overcome the sound of 14 generators.
16. People will get into a line that has already formed without having any idea what the line is for.
17. When required, a Lincoln Continental will float, doesn't steer well but floats just the same.
18. Tele-marketers function no matter what the weather is doing.
19. Cell phones work when land lines are down, but only as long as the battery remains charged.
20. 27 of your neighbors are fed from a different transformer than you, and they are quick to point that out!
21. Hampers were not made to contain such a volume.
22. If my store sold only ice, chainsaws, gas and generators... I'd be rich.
23. Price of a can of soup rises 200% in a storm.
24. Your water front property can quickly become someone else's fishing hole.
25. Tree service companies are under appreciated.
26. I learned what happens when you make fun of another states' blackout.
27. MATH 101: 30 days in month, minus 6 days without power equals 30%
higher electric bill?
28. Drywall is a compound word, take away the "dry" part and it's
worthless.
29. I can walk a lot farther than I thought.

Normal

I will probably never take “normal” for granted again. We are slowly getting our normal life back after Ike came ripping and roaring through our city. We got our electricity back on Sunday night. (THANK YOU ALABAMA CREW MEN FOR WORKING HARD ON OUR LINES) It was bitter sweet though for us. Our neighbors across the street did not get theirs back; it’s hard to be excited when they are still hot and in the dark – hopefully today they will have good news too. The kids went back to school this morning. They were all excited to see their friends, they need normal too! Hopefully they don’t have to make up all 7 days they were out of school. Now we just need cable back…we are missing all the premieres this week.

Ike

Hurricane Ike has come and gone and left a huge impression in most people’s lives. We sat outside for a long time Friday, feeling the winds pretty early on. It was a nice night but it turned ugly fast. We lost power around 3am Saturday morning. I was one of those people who really thought they would be able to sleep right through it. WRONG! I couldn’t sleep, it was scary. Listening to the winds slam against our windows and the rain pound was just nerve wracking and something I have never heard before. I wasn’t sure if our big picture windows would handle what Ike brought. Thankfully we got through the night just fine. The kids didn’t wake once.

When we woke up Saturday morning the kids and I jumped on our bikes to see what Ike had done to our neighborhood. It was surreal and unreal. This was stuff you see on TV not your own neighborhood. We were swerving through debris and down power lines, just a disaster. Our neighborhood was destroyed by our beautiful trees we take pride in. It was very sad to see.

We have no power. We have no clue when power will be restored. We have seen 2 Center Point Energy people in the neighborhood assessing the damage. I talked to one yesterday and he said they are working their way towards us. We do however have running water which is good; it’s nice to be able to bathe the kids and myself! We have been lucky with great weather. I guess it is Mother Nature’s way of apologizing for her destruction!

As of now there is no school for the week. The kids have been doing ok. We have been outside day and night but they love it. They watch movies on the dvd player at night. They are missing the computer the most.

Hopefully by this time next week all will be normal. My camera ran out of batteries so I will upload pictures tomorrow.

Hurricane ready...

We are ready for Hurricane Ike. We are not evacuating, we are staying put and I wanted to share a few pictures of how we prepared. I am thinking after tonight we will not have power for a few days, I am hoping I am wrong but we usually loose power because of all the trees around our house. I will take pictures of the aftermath around our neighborhood if anyting huge happens, hopefully not though!


Our street on Friday, sunny. We had the kids outside for most of the day trying to blow off some energy before they are stuck inside all day Saturday.


Jagi's patio table turned over by us not Ike, we didnt want it going through the windows.


Jagi's fountain, it was too heavy to move so Grandpa and Carlos tied it down...we are hoping it doesnt tip!


And last but not least, the most important...a fridge full of beer. I guess they will have to drink it all before we dont have electricity!

Hurricanes...what an in inconvenience!

Well it looks like Ike is a comin’ although I think I am still the only one holding out hope that the orange line that takes it straight to Louisiana will actually happen on the hurricane tracker! Mom did her normal hurricane shopping this morning. I think we are prepared; I don’t know if you ever have enough but you plan for the worst and hope for the best. Lots of people are evacuating, jobs and schools are closing down, freeways are getting packed, store shelves are becoming bare. We are staying home. The last major storm where people were told to evacuate was back in September 2005, good ol’ Rita. We actually did evacuate but our plans had been set for quite awhile. It was the weekend my brother was getting married. We got lucky that we were leaving town although the airports were ridiculous and we were literally running for the gates – we made it though!

Hopefully we have electricity so I can post next week. Keep your fingers crossed that Ike doesn’t turn out as bad as everyone is expecting!

We are tired!

It’s been a long week, very long week and we only had 4 days, its funny how that happens. We have all been exhausted, like 8:00pm bedtime exhausted. I get home and can’t wait until 8 so I can go upstairs and just lay in my bed!

Kaela loves school – amazing what middle school does to kids. Last year she struggled with homework, hated it, and hated working on it. It would literally take her hours to finish very simple tasks. This year is a complete change. She gets home and gets right to work; she ever redoes some of it just so it looks nice. I really hope the trend sticks all year long! We have open house next Thursday so I am interested to see what her teachers have to say about her. She seems to love most of her teachers; she has lots of friends on her bus, not much complaining on her end.

Bryanna has more homework then last year and she has defiantly noticed. She gets it done right after school because if she waits it all goes downhill, attitude and tiredness does not equal homework getting finished. She seems to like her class and her teacher. I did however overhear that she and another boy were calling each other names. They are fairly good friends so I am sure they were just playing but we did have a talk about it, it’s never nice to call people names.

Jonathan = school…not so much! He has had the hardest week. Many excuses: doesn’t feel good, can’t find socks, don’t like this, plain I just don’t want to go, crying in the mornings. Poor thing, he went through the same issue last year for the first 2 weeks, the difference this year is that Jagi isn’t at the school and isn’t in the same hall as him now! Hopefully he snaps out of his funk. I emailed his teacher when I got to work today and she said he was fine after I left but leaving a crying child is hard.

Anyhoo that has been our week. We have ZERO plans this weekend and I am so glad!

Garner State Park

We officially made it past the first week of school. The kids actually only went 3 days. They were out Thursday and Friday for our annual Garner State Park trip.

WE were all very excited to take this trip. We purchased a travel trailer back in June and this was our first time trying it out. The travel trailer was awesome and so was camping. It was a much needed get-a-way that we always look forward to. The weather was fantastic and the water was perfect. The kids were exhausted by night fall. Lots of food, games and family.


Mommy and Kaela in the Frio River


Bryanna relaxing...she knows what to do on vacation


Jonathan ready to get on the rope swing


Kaela and Bryanna making smores

We can't wait until we get to use the travel trailer again, we are scouting out new places to go!