Hurricane Ike

Well, we hunkered down and got the crap scared out of us, but we are all okay! We truly feel blessed in all of this. Our house is okay, our kids are okay and we have power! God is good!

Those winds were the loudest and scariest that I have ever heard in my life! I can't even explain it to people that weren't here. Truly wild! It started howling here around 11:00 and did not let up AT ALL until 6am. We lost power around 6:30 Friday evening. When that happened so early, I knew that we were in for a long night. Matt and I were up listening to the radio about 3:00am when somebody from Shadowcreek called in and the weather guy said that we were in for another 3 hours. Not too long after that, one of the chains from our outside light fixture pulled out of the brick and started swinging into our entry glass. That's when I freaked! I was a big girl until then. Luckily, it never broke. All in all, we were so very lucky! Here are some pictures.

Notice, the gate was still standing. The boards from this fence were flying into the side of the house all night.

And here, a close call for the a/c unit. It is dented, but working.Here is a section of fence down on the other side.Around 7 am when the howling had stopped and the sun was coming up, I looked at Matt and said, "Do you think Starbucks is open?". The trees were still blowing sideways, but somehow, it just seemed like nothing then. Right after that, I got a text from our neighbors, the Blakes, saying, "We've got coffee!". They had a generator and we camped out over there for a couple of days. We got a generator on Sunday evening and then our power came on a few hours after that.

Here, you can see that Cade has spent a little too much times with the girls!

All of the kids eating dinner. They loved "camping". They even went swimming at the Browns the day after the storm.

Here is Cade playing in the generator box. They have found lots of entertainment from that.

We have had lots of visitors and company. Luckily, the Koza's house in Galveston fared just fine. I don't know how, but it did!! Here are Patrick and Cannon hanging out on Saturday.

Cara and the boys have been in and out all week since we are blessed to have power! Such a luxury!! Parker was trying to evacuate here.Doug and Trish came back from Austin on Tuesday after we gave them the good news about our power and groceries. The boys love having Ryan here! Luckily, their house in Seabrook is totally fine too and now they have power as well. We have been struggling to keep everyone entertained. I heard that the zoo was open on Wednesday, so we headed over there. That was fun and the weather was awesome. Avery went with us too.

Then, when taking Auntie Nilza home the other day, I noticed a ton of baby ducks over in the Silverlake pond. The boys had a blast feeding the ducks. I don't know how these little bitty ducks made it through that storm, but they did!Carson is more into feeding the giant catfish that were taking the bread right out of his hand.Now, we have weathered the storm and everyone is sick. Cannon has a double ear infection and a nasty cough. Both boys have snot gallore and Cade's allergies are off the chart due to everything in the air and the down trees everywhere. The great news: School Opens MONDAY!! Praise God!! They are going to stay home this weekend and get better b/c we will be there when the doors open! Carson has asked every morning if he could go to school.

All in all, we feel so very fortunate! Our land line phone even started working last night, so I can actually communicate other than text messages now. We are truly living in luxury here! My Dad and Cyndi don't even have water, much less power, so we a very appreciative.

We hope that everyone else sustained minor damage as well! I don't know about y'all, but I just sat through my last hurricane! Lesson learned there.....if this thing was only a category 2 or 3, I surely don't want to be here for the big one!

XOXO