Daddy's Favorite Little Valentine
Mmmm....Party Snacks!
She's such a big girl! She drank the juice box all by herself!
It's all gone, Mommy!
Chocolate makes any little Valentine happy!
Friday, February 13, 2009
Happy Valentine's Day!
I realize that it's not technically Valentine's Day, but today was Madilyn's party at school, so in her world, it is! (Sorry, some of them are a little blurry...the phone on my camera doesn't take good "action" shots!)
Mmmm....Party Snacks!
She's such a big girl!
She drank the juice box all by herself!
It's all gone, Mommy!
Chocolate makes any little Valentine happy!
Mmmm....Party Snacks!She's such a big girl! She drank the juice box all by herself!
It's all gone, Mommy! Chocolate makes any little Valentine happy!
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Like Nothing I've Ever Experienced Before...
For those who didn't already know, we were caught right in the midst of the ice storms that swept through Middle America. It started raining and sleeting last Monday night (January 26th) and by Tuesday morning, there was enough accumulation that we couldn't get out of our driveway to go to work. That was just as well, though, because we lost power around 9:00am just before wave #2 came through. Lucky for us, we have a gas fireplace that helped keep the house warm and toasty. If the thermostat read correctly, it never dipped below 65 degrees in the house (with the exception of a few bedrooms we closed off in an effort to centralize the heat.
We also have a gas water heater, so we were able to take warm showers...even though we couldn't dry our hair. Scott really gave me a hard time for complaining that I couldn't do my hair, but ladies, I know you understand! Scott never uses a hair dryer or curling iron anyway - he just runs a little gel through it and combs it how he wants it to stay. It drys on it's own and looks normal. For me, that doesn't exactly work. I have naturally curly hair, but it's not exactly pretty and tamed curls without help. Some of it is tight curls, some areas are loose curls, and for some reason, some parts don't seem to curl at all. It looks a fright! Let alone the fact that I have bangs that just curl up when they're not dried! It wasn't until Thursday afternoon/evening that we felt like the ice had melted enough that it was possible for us to think about venturing out of our driveway (which is a hill on top of of a different hill that's our street...for those of you who haven't been out to the house). Even Scott was willing to admit that my hair was less than desirable. As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention - we decided that it would be a really good idea for someone to design a battery operated hair dryer to put in the household emergency kit along with the flashlight and bottled water! I know you're laughing, but you'll think the same thing after living days on end without power!
While we were at the house, we spent our daylight hours picking up around the house, planning meals that we could eat (the propane grill was our only source of cooking heat) and going outside for a change of scenery. Scott went out on the 4-wheeler a couple of times so that he could assess the roads and determine whether or not it would be safe for us to leave. Madilyn and I went for a ride with him once. We both had fun, but Madilyn was sandwiched in between both of us in an effort to protect her from the cold winds, so she couldn't see much. She ended up falling into such a deep sleep that Scott yelled at her to wake her up - she gave us a little fright that we might have covered her up too much!
In the evenings, we tried to cook our dinner just before the sun went down. It was just too hard to cook on the grill with just a flashlight. We were also lucky enough to have our electronics charged just enough to allow us to watch a few movies. One night, we watched a movie on the laptop (the battery lasted just long enough for the movie...we missed the credits). Another night, we watched something on the portable dvd player. On Thursday, when we were able to venture out of the house, we took the dvd player up to my office to charge it in order to watch again that night. If we weren't watching a movie, then Scott and I played a few board games by candle and flashlight : ) We also sat and listened to the eerily, creepy sound of trees snapping and breaking. I kid you not, it's no exaggeration to say that it sounded like a gun battle going on right in our yard. That's the analogy that quite a few people ended up using.
Friday, we were still without electricity, but the roads were clear enough that we were able to go to work. Let me tell you....that was a less than desireable day! Believe it or not, it was my birthday, but it was also month-end close at work and there was no way I could get out of it. Since there weren't many other people who'd been able to get in to the office that week either, we primarily had a week's worth of work to get done in one day (stockholders don't wait for their earnings reports!) I got to work around 7:00 in the morning, and returned home about 10:00 that night. Luckily, Madilyn's daycare had their power restored on Thursday evening, so she was able to go and play with her friends while Scott and I played catch up. After Scott got off work, he went and picked up Madilyn and they went and got me a birthday cake that read, "Happy Sucky Birthday!" That was a neat treat when they brought it up here to the office. Here's a funny story....the lady at the grocery store asked Scott who Sucky was! :)
When I got home from work, I had to park at the neighbors house and walk to ours b/c the driveway was still too slick to drive up. Scott met me with a flashlight while Madilyn stayed asleep in her pack-n-play. As we were walking back to the house, I kept hearing some sort of squeaking that I couldn't identify. Turns out, it was an 18-wheeler feed truck trying to make it to some of the chicken farms that are past our house. The squeaks I was hearing were his air brakes because he started down our road when it looked clear, but by the time he realized it wasn't clear, it was too late to turn around! Scott went back up the road to flag him down and let him know that there were still trees down blocking parts of our road. Our next door neighbors have a very wide mouth opening to their driveway, so he was able to pull over there, and Scott helped him put chains on his tires while I held the flashlights. Then we walked the rest of our road with him to show him where his obstacles were (and where the road dropped off to a revene). Whew! What a day! Needless to say, I crashed once I made it to bed.
On Saturday, we loaded up and headed to Scott's parents house. They live about 30 minutes away, and their power had been restored on Thursday. I have never enjoyed blow drying my hair so much! Turns out, our power was restored on Sunday evening, but we were already settled in at the Savage's and too tired at that point to pack up. After work on Monday, we went back to collect our belongings and slept in our own house with electricity on Monday night! Ahhh....the simple pleasures of life!
Unfortunately, we started taking pictures of the ice after the first wave and since we didn't have a way to re-charge it, the battery was too low after the second wave of ice came through. We did get pictures of it, but it's all on the video camera (and we haven't figured out how to download those clips yet.) Sooo....check out these pictures and then imagine another layer of ice on top of it! I'll post videos of the area as soon as I can (I'm certain that some of them have the sounds of cracking trees on them!) Sorry for the long post....I had to paint the whole picture in order for you to fully appreciate it, though!
This is the layer of ice on my sidewalk lights on Tuesday 
It's kinda hard to see, but if you look hard,
We also have a gas water heater, so we were able to take warm showers...even though we couldn't dry our hair. Scott really gave me a hard time for complaining that I couldn't do my hair, but ladies, I know you understand! Scott never uses a hair dryer or curling iron anyway - he just runs a little gel through it and combs it how he wants it to stay. It drys on it's own and looks normal. For me, that doesn't exactly work. I have naturally curly hair, but it's not exactly pretty and tamed curls without help. Some of it is tight curls, some areas are loose curls, and for some reason, some parts don't seem to curl at all. It looks a fright! Let alone the fact that I have bangs that just curl up when they're not dried! It wasn't until Thursday afternoon/evening that we felt like the ice had melted enough that it was possible for us to think about venturing out of our driveway (which is a hill on top of of a different hill that's our street...for those of you who haven't been out to the house). Even Scott was willing to admit that my hair was less than desirable. As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention - we decided that it would be a really good idea for someone to design a battery operated hair dryer to put in the household emergency kit along with the flashlight and bottled water! I know you're laughing, but you'll think the same thing after living days on end without power!
While we were at the house, we spent our daylight hours picking up around the house, planning meals that we could eat (the propane grill was our only source of cooking heat) and going outside for a change of scenery. Scott went out on the 4-wheeler a couple of times so that he could assess the roads and determine whether or not it would be safe for us to leave. Madilyn and I went for a ride with him once. We both had fun, but Madilyn was sandwiched in between both of us in an effort to protect her from the cold winds, so she couldn't see much. She ended up falling into such a deep sleep that Scott yelled at her to wake her up - she gave us a little fright that we might have covered her up too much!
In the evenings, we tried to cook our dinner just before the sun went down. It was just too hard to cook on the grill with just a flashlight. We were also lucky enough to have our electronics charged just enough to allow us to watch a few movies. One night, we watched a movie on the laptop (the battery lasted just long enough for the movie...we missed the credits). Another night, we watched something on the portable dvd player. On Thursday, when we were able to venture out of the house, we took the dvd player up to my office to charge it in order to watch again that night. If we weren't watching a movie, then Scott and I played a few board games by candle and flashlight : ) We also sat and listened to the eerily, creepy sound of trees snapping and breaking. I kid you not, it's no exaggeration to say that it sounded like a gun battle going on right in our yard. That's the analogy that quite a few people ended up using.
Friday, we were still without electricity, but the roads were clear enough that we were able to go to work. Let me tell you....that was a less than desireable day! Believe it or not, it was my birthday, but it was also month-end close at work and there was no way I could get out of it. Since there weren't many other people who'd been able to get in to the office that week either, we primarily had a week's worth of work to get done in one day (stockholders don't wait for their earnings reports!) I got to work around 7:00 in the morning, and returned home about 10:00 that night. Luckily, Madilyn's daycare had their power restored on Thursday evening, so she was able to go and play with her friends while Scott and I played catch up. After Scott got off work, he went and picked up Madilyn and they went and got me a birthday cake that read, "Happy Sucky Birthday!" That was a neat treat when they brought it up here to the office. Here's a funny story....the lady at the grocery store asked Scott who Sucky was! :)
When I got home from work, I had to park at the neighbors house and walk to ours b/c the driveway was still too slick to drive up. Scott met me with a flashlight while Madilyn stayed asleep in her pack-n-play. As we were walking back to the house, I kept hearing some sort of squeaking that I couldn't identify. Turns out, it was an 18-wheeler feed truck trying to make it to some of the chicken farms that are past our house. The squeaks I was hearing were his air brakes because he started down our road when it looked clear, but by the time he realized it wasn't clear, it was too late to turn around! Scott went back up the road to flag him down and let him know that there were still trees down blocking parts of our road. Our next door neighbors have a very wide mouth opening to their driveway, so he was able to pull over there, and Scott helped him put chains on his tires while I held the flashlights. Then we walked the rest of our road with him to show him where his obstacles were (and where the road dropped off to a revene). Whew! What a day! Needless to say, I crashed once I made it to bed.
On Saturday, we loaded up and headed to Scott's parents house. They live about 30 minutes away, and their power had been restored on Thursday. I have never enjoyed blow drying my hair so much! Turns out, our power was restored on Sunday evening, but we were already settled in at the Savage's and too tired at that point to pack up. After work on Monday, we went back to collect our belongings and slept in our own house with electricity on Monday night! Ahhh....the simple pleasures of life!
Unfortunately, we started taking pictures of the ice after the first wave and since we didn't have a way to re-charge it, the battery was too low after the second wave of ice came through. We did get pictures of it, but it's all on the video camera (and we haven't figured out how to download those clips yet.) Sooo....check out these pictures and then imagine another layer of ice on top of it! I'll post videos of the area as soon as I can (I'm certain that some of them have the sounds of cracking trees on them!) Sorry for the long post....I had to paint the whole picture in order for you to fully appreciate it, though!
up on Tuesday morning. It looks like a river bed, huh?!
That's our gravel driveway covered with a thick layer of ice!
This is what our back yard looked like as the trees were
beginning to sag. If we would have known then what we
know now, we would have titled this the "before" picture.
It looks like a tornado came through our yard since this picture
because most if not all of these trees had their tops snap off.
This is the layer of ice on my sidewalk lights on Tuesday morning. After the second wave came through, you couldn't
even see the rock sidewalk...it was solid white.
Madilyn actually enjoyed getting bundled up
and riding around the yard in her car!
(I didn't bother putting her mittens on since her
arms were tucked up in there anyway!)
It's kinda hard to see, but if you look hard,
you can see the ice accumulation on the power lines.
This was Scott's first effort to show how thick the ice
was on each branch in comparison to his finger
This is measurement effort #2...you can clearly see
This was Scott's first effort to show how thick the ice
was on each branch in comparison to his finger
This is measurement effort #2...you can clearly see
that it was at least an inch thick - if not more.
Here's what the trees started looking like before they snapped.
I think this must have been one of the first trees down on
Scott took a picture of these power lines down on the dirt
Another shot of trees down in our road.
Here's what the trees started looking like before they snapped.
These particular tree tops are no longer there. They eventually
snapped and broke (but luckily didn't fall on the shed and damage it!)
I think this must have been one of the first trees down on
the road in front of our house. Eventually, there were several
clustered up here. It was actually kinda a pretty canopy if you
disregarded the fact that cars need to drive on this road.
Scott took a picture of these power lines down on the dirt
road that our street intersects with. This was actually a
common site all over NW Arkansas - hence the reason that
there were literally hundreds of thousands of customers
without power for days on end (estimates say that
there are still approx 15,000 customers who
still don't have power to this day)
Another shot of trees down in our road.
That's our next door neighbor's mail box.
This is a shot at the bottom of our street looking up the hill.
This is a shot at the bottom of our street looking up the hill.
It doesn't look like much other than some branches down
in the front, but look further back...there are so many
trees down that you can't see the rest of the road.
(I will admit that we were lucky not to have lost any of
our huge 100+ year old oak trees. Other places around town
weren't so lucky. All of the trees we lost were at least small
enough that you could wrap your arms around the trunk)
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