the storm

In case you were wondering where in the world I went let me tell you. It all started Sunday after church. The clouds were looking super dark-I knew a storm was coming and my little family made a mad dash for the car in hopes of avoiding the rain. Little did we know that the rain would be the least of our worries. We drove home two girls who had no car and had far to walk and then started towards Einstein Bagels-our Sunday tradition. It was raining really hard at this point but was pretty fun...it felt a little like being inside a car wash. My mom called, her voice was panicked, scared even-which is entirely not like my mom. "Don't leave church!!" She yelled over the phone, " It is like a war zone out here, trees falling down everywhere...it is crazy don't leave!!" I calmly told her we had already left church, as I thought to myself that she was overreacting a bit about this rain and a few leaves blowing about. "Go home!!" she said and then ended the call. I turned to Nate and we decided to head home...we turned up a street about three blocks from our house and started up it...that is when the real storm hit.

Suddenly we could not see through our windshield, so much rain, it seemed like bucket after bucket was being dumped. Then the trees, leaves, branches, whole gigantic trees started falling all around us as we crept along in our van. I was so frightened. I remember stretching out both arms-as if to hold the trees off of our car-and just yelling out a prayer to God. "Please Lord, please keep these trees from falling on us, please keep these trees from falling on us!!" My children knew I was scared and they quickly became frightened as well. I turned to the back with a fake smile, "Just pray to God to protect us...He hears us when we pray!!" And pray we all did...right up to when we pulled in the driveway.

It was hailing now and blowing so so so so hard. I opened to door and jumped out of the van, wanting to grab my baby girl as quickly as I could. The moment I was out of the van fear gripped me in a new way. The wind felt like the scene from Wizard of Oz...the part when Dorothy is trying to get into her house and the twister is coming up the road. It seriously felt like that. Hail was pounding against me and it hurt. I started shaking and I yelled to Nate to get the other two kids fast!! I grabbed Vera and she was immediately crying from the pain of the wind and hail hitting her. We rushed inside and realized we had lost power, we rushed to the basement...I was sure it was a tornado. But it wasn't.

Just 5 minutes later the storm was over. Just a storm. A storm with 100+ miles per hour wind, hail and rain. A storm that knocked down so many trees you literally could not find a single street that was not lined with tree branches or entire fallen trees. The power lines were snapped or dangling and everywhere was without power. I will never forget this storm or the damage it caused.

Tonight is Thursday, this happened on Sunday and it is the first time I have had power in my house since that storm. The weather here has been in the upper 90's...even reaching into the 100's. Not the best time to be without power. Insanity. Sheer insanity. Here are a few shots I took right after the it first hit.