Hurricane Irene

Wow! What a crazy week! We started the week with an earthquake and ended with a hurricane!

We live on the East Coast and were affected by both, although the hurricane actually takes some preparation. If you need information on what to do in the event of a hurricane, one of the best websites is the American Red Cross. They have an extensive checklist for those who like to (and I recommend that you need to) prepare ahead of time. One of the things that happened locally was that most stores ran out of the essential items like bottled water and batteries over 24 hours before the hurricane got here! Thankfully, we had already picked up the things we needed, but not everyone was so lucky. One thing I didn't see on the Red Cross website was the need to fill up the bathtub before the power goes out if widespread power outages are expected. This sounds silly, but if the power is going to be out for 2-3 days, it would be nice to have water handy to flush the toilet or freshen up! I wouldn't want to be flushing my drinking water!

We are so relieved that Hurricane Irene skirted to the east a little more than we initially thought it would, so many of the preparations we made were not needed.  However, many of our friends were out of power for over 24 hours and thousands of people had to evacuate prior to the storm. Since we weren't really sure how bad it would be, and my husband was expecting to have to stay at work for the duration, I chose to ride out the storm with my inlaws (they are awesome!).  They live on slightly higher ground than I do, in a newer house, with less chance of getting stranded due to flooding. 

The main problem we had to face (thankfully), was boredom. I mean, we had 2 kids and 3 dogs plus 4 adults all stuck inside for an entire day! Here are some of the things we packed to try and stave off boredom as long as possible.

1. Puzzles- Jeff's mom has tons of puzzles for the girls, but we brought a challenging one that we could all work on together.  300 pieces is probably about the largest puzzle I have ever worked on. This was a really nice one, with larger pieces.  

2. Fuzzoodles- "What is a Fuzzoodle?" you ask. It is the little monster thing that gets created when you add really fuzzy, thick pipecleaners to big feet and goofy eyes. I can thank Nana for this present.  The girls were really proud of their creations, though. The cool thing is that they can be taken apart and put back in a different way, over and over again.

3. Books- We brought Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder. We have been reading it before bed for awhile and the girls are really enjoying it so far.

4. the iPad- when I bought this, I really thought it was mine. In reality, the girls play on it almost as much as I do.

5. Sticker Mosaic-  Mikayla and Susie received a sticker mosaic project for their birthdays. Since then, we have bought a few more and Mikayla loves to work on these!

Aside from the things I packed, the girls were very interested in the weather updates. With their granparents, they watched the updates on television and then went outside in the garage to watch the rain and wind effects. They slipped in the garage a few times, but it was a nice way to let them see what was going on without being in the wind and rain. Once again, we were very lucky. None of the tornadoes were in our immediate vicinity and we experienced no structural damage to our home. The good thing is that now we know what we need to do to be prepared for the next one, whenever it is.

One last observation- Nothing exhibits the power of our Creator like an awesome storm. It rages all around making a person wonder if their manmade homes will withstand the wind and water pummeling it. During Hurricane Irene, one of the things that totally amazed me was the hummingbirds that were flying in the middle of the storm to feed at their feeders!  I couldn't even believe it! They are so tiny (none of the other birds were out!) yet God created them in such a way they could fly in the midst of the storm.  So many times this week, I found myself worrying. Worrying about my husband, my children, the house, the pets, and so on. A passage that always comes to mind at these times is in Matthew 6:26-27. "Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?"  I am not suggesting we ignore sensible preparations in the event of a storm, but to keep things in perspective. A Heavenly perspective.