The Storm

Around 5pm last Friday evening, the tornado sirens began their eerie song. I stepped outside and looked out at the strangely advancing clouds, felt the wind shifting, and then quickly herded the family to the shelter of the basement. With in minutes the electricity blinked off. We heard heavy rain, pelting hail, and forceful winds. The most scary sound was that of things blowing around out there- HARD. Praying for safety, and devising a plan to quickly stuff every one under the guest bed in the corner, I was not going to be surprised if a real tornado came down. To this day, I don't think they have determined it to be any thing more than straight line winds (up to 100mph)--but after looking at this evidence... what do you think?

Here is one of the trees we lost right in the middle of the yard. It gave us some great shade, so having it gone has really changed the landscape. There are still a few little trees in this cluster that are still standing.

This is the view looking to the very back of our yard. The picture really doesn't do justice to show the amounts of branches that came down and other debris blown in from a nearby building. The big white chunks are actually siding and insulation from an assisted living tower across the street from us. Notice the odd fog settling back there?

Our neighbors all lost some large trees too- roots and all.
Here are a couple of pictures of the marble sized hail- it looked like snow, and even drifted in some areas. Later I heard my friend brilliantly collected the hail that had fallen in her yard and put it in buckets in her fridge and freezer to keep things cool while the power was out. Wish I had thought of that! We were out of power for about 22 hours. I was able to borrow space in our church fridge and freezer until our power came back on.
And my poor garden... almost all shredded. We may be able to save the carrots, and are waiting to see if the corn and tomatoes will make a come-back. The rest-- gone.

Just today, I went out to clean up the rhubarb patch. In the pic you can see the hail shredded leaves- but look! Four days after the storm... and it's growing back already! Amazing Man will be expecting a few more pies this season, now.

Here is view of the St. Joseph's Assisted Living Tower that is across the street and a block and a half up the hill from our house. Huge amounts of the plaster siding and yellow insulation that blew that blew off of this building landed in our back yard.

Amazing Man and N hauled a portion of the heavy siding from that building out of our back yard. The rest filled up at least five trash cans... and even today I am still picking up more bits and pieces that are still blowing around.

We hauled all the limbs and branches to the back of our property- there are mounds! Many thanks to Uncle J and several from our church family who came over to help clean up. Now, we need to rent a chipper or something...Or have a Wiener Roast every weekend until Christmas. "Kum Ba Ya" anyone??

The neighbors up the street were not so lucky, but hooray... our playground still stands!!

Clean up continues... a little bit every day. We are so thankful for our safety. Our house and lives were spared from damage, and for that we are praising Him!