Year 2, Day 279: The Aftermath

When Abishai came into our room at normal time this morning, I left him with Jared so I could take pictures of the tree(s) and yard before any clean up could happen.  We needed to attend church first, but I didn't know if the energy company would come and do anything while we were gone, and I wanted pictures of how everything was just in case we needed them for insurance and what not.  I tried to think like an insurance agent and took way too many pictures.  The roof and house and playground were spared.  The widowed elderly neighbor's porch fence was not.  I wanted us to go help her, but the twins, Marco and Mario, were already at it when we came home.  Marco lives next to us and Mario lives behind the widow.  Both are the best kind of neighbors you could ever have.  We are very blessed to be surrounded by many people like that in our neighborhood.  They came over and helped Jared with the biggest part of the clean up - taking down the rest of the broken branches - when they were done at Mary's house.  We all went out and helped do what we could we the yard for a couple of hours, even Abishai.  There's still more to do, but there's nothing else in danger.  As you will see, we were spared big time.

In fact, we had more damage than Jared's brother and sister in law in New Orleans at Hurricane Nate went through the New Orleans area.  It was only a category 1 hurricane, but, the Shauna and the girls stayed with friends inland a ways.  Aaron stayed to help if it was needed.  They live below sea level and south of New Orleans right near the gulf, where there was 10 ft of water after Katrina, in Chalmette.  So, I'm so over this wacky weather!  It's probably because I'm prone to anxiety, especially about the safety of my people and my stuff, but I despise the thought of physical objects being damaged and replaced because it feel like a waste of money.  It's definitely an issue of mine that I will have to keep working with God on.  And yes, the sermon, once again, addressed trusting God and not being anxious, in Matthew 10.  And since we were in the "nosebleed" seats again thanks to Justin's choosing, it made it hard to look at the preacher because I know I'm guilty of this in very big ways.

Since I "bounced" out of bed, I got to see the moon set!  Unfortunately, all my pictures are darker than they should be because I had set my aperture lower and didn't reset it when I was done the other day.  Whoops!

Our poor neighbor's fence, including our slide on our porch!

Our neighbor's pear tree is totally gone!

Leaves on the clothesline.

The wind tore off the nail that the lock for the shed hooked onto.  Now we really need to figure out a good lock before winter or the door will be constantly open with the winds.

The branch totally forked the playground.  Thankfully, the playground held strong!

Wow

The branch just scratched the boys' windows, but didn't leave a mark and didn't make it to the roof, praise the Lord.

Ugly!

Branches from the tree did make it onto the roof and over the house to the sidewalk!  No damage, but there's a few stray branches up there!

Birch bark from a neighbor's house ON OUR DRIVEWAY.

Overturned trash can.

No scratches but I think a branch hit the van, too.

The view from in the sunroom.

Best helper ever!  No whining like the other kids.  It's a game to him and he did actually pick up a lot!

Branches on the roof.

Marco and Mario helping our neighbor, Mary.

We'll be picking up sticks for days!  I warned them if they misbehave, I'll send them out for 10 minutes of stick picking up.

Big helpers!

Abishai took this picture! (see other pictures below)

Trying to use the monkey bar!

Oh no, not the pallets again!

Good grief! Please don't fall!

Jared actually screws the pallets into the tree before he uses them as ladders.  Genius!

Pretty flowers near the rocks out back!

Sniffing the flowers.

Hands on hips, ready to take on the world.

Perfection!  I need to print this one out!  He wasn't terribly mad, but rather annoyed that it was naptime. I had already stretched out naptime to 3 pm, instead of 2 pm, in case the men would need to do a bunch of sawing.

Time to build a fire!  We don't want carpenter ants or termites going everywhere.

And this is why it broke.  The tree does have either carpenter ants or termites affecting several of the branches.  It is probably time for it to come down, if it's not treatable.

My husband is so brave!

All cleaned up!

I'm enjoying this app for Air1 radio which is a sister station to K-Love, which is nationwide Christian station.  There's no talking on this app and the songs are shall we say, more "rock and roll" than K-Love.  Ok, it's more like contemporary Christian rock, but it's artists that are louder and up and coming like Skillet and Tenth Avenue North and Matthew West and Newsboys and Hillsong  Young and Free.  It's aim is the younger crowd, let's put it that way.  So, I love it!  I've been following some of these artists on Instagram and to be honest, I'm a little jealous that I can't afford to go see them all.  I love CCM and concerts and the like. I want to take the kids to them, but some, like Newsboys, are pretty pricey.  The cheap tickets for Newsboys are like $50!  And that's for seats way up in the rafters of the big arenas!  No thank you!  Other concerts might be in the $25 range for halfway decent seats.  But I enjoy up front as much as possible, too.  I'm going to make it a priority to take them to WinterJam in February, which has several of the big artists and geared toward the teens and it's usually pretty cheap.  But you have to stand a ton, so we'll see.  Music has been a big part of my life and I just haven't had time to keep up with it.  I miss it, so this is helping.

This is a better picture of the tree "forking" the playground!

Looking through the boys' window.  Justin didn't realize it was there.

I remember when this spinning drum set was brand new.  I went to the tour when it debuted.  I'm so happy it's still around.  I follow the Newsboys' drummer on Instagram, who is the only original Newsboys left in the band!  And he's the extrovert spokesperson for the group.  I think I've met him 3 times or so.  The drum kit is screwed down, and Duncan straps himself into a seat, then it's lifted up, tilted, and spins!

Keturah is getting Joanna Grace ready for church!  Complete with a dress, tights and putting her hair in a ponytail.  Keturah said she watched a tutorial on YouTube about doing dolls' hair!  It saddens me that I haven't helped her, but at the same time, my own skills are limited, so I'm also glad she found help.

Hilarious for adults, but not at all appropriate for kids.  Movieguide.org counted 39 obscenities and the characters bickered the whole time without any resolution.  And it doesn't add to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  We are not adding it to our collection.

We gave Ice Cream's and Gramma's cars some pat pat loves on the way into church.

More clearing of the tree limbs.

That's everything that fell from the tree.  Wow!

Cheese!

I kept the strap looped around my neck, but let Abishai take a few pictures on the camera.

He was so into it!

Adorable!

Baby slobber!

Warming up with a sugar free dairy free homemade peppermint mocha using Tim Horton's coffee! And catching up on blog posts!

Yummy ingredients!

Meanwhile, I did hear some loud noises last night around 10:30 and it must have been the electric company clearing branches somewhere.  A friend said other trees were down west of us.  I'm glad they got to it quickly.  Our line is still a bit droopy, so we'll see who or when that gets fixed.  Then it started to rain again, so the guys had to stop working.  They were tired and sore, too.  Time for dinner and to take Keturah to kids' choir practice.  The boys didn't have Crave because it's now fall break for our township.  They will be off for 3 Sundays because fall break is a full two weeks.  We'll be taking our fall break not this week, but next week when Benaiah has his.  So, I'm sure Keturah will get together with a friend once or twice in the time frame and we'll find other fun things to do.  Stay tuned!

For now, I do see God's hand in this "emergency."  We didn't lose power.  There's no damage to any of our "stuff" like the roofs and the playground (the slide cracked).  No one was hurt. And the clean up so far wasn't horrible.  We have great helpful neighbors who initiate conversation and look out for one another.  It's awesome!  And we're ready for some great evening fires once the temps finally cool off!