I HEART POWER!

Fair warning...this is going to be a long post & lots of pictures. I'm doing this partly so others can see what the last week and a half was like for our family, but also as a sort of journal for myself of the events due to snow, ice, wind, etc...

Basically our family was housebound from Sunday January 15th - Tuesday January 24th.

We just got internet, phone & cable back this evening so we are now back to "normal".

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday were fairly uneventful, we got lots of snow, but for us in Western WA that is fun for a few days, no school b/c of the snow so we had lots of great family time & time hanging out with the neighbors. Tuesday & Wednesday we lost power for a couple hours each day, but no big deal...it came back on & all was good.

Wednesday afternoon the girls and I spent about 2 hours on this "snow family", such fun.

The power flickered all of Wednesday evening, but it stayed on all night. Sometime around 6am on Thursday we lost power again. Kind of a hassle, but I was certain it would be back on within a couple of hours. It still looked pretty outside, strange with a solid layer of ice over all the snow, but still pretty to look at.

Two texts from King 5 News...

I did not really understand what an "ice storm" meant... now I do & as long as I live around trees, I hope to never experience another ice storm. The morning plugged on, still now power and we are hearing that the numbers of those without power is quickly climbing by tens of thousands! The Governor declares a state of emergency... never a good sign.

Below is a picture of a tree right outside our bedroom, the first picture was taken around 8am & the second is the same tree, this time around noon.

All day long we heard cracking & trees falling, it was not safe to be outside. At this point it is sounding like we could be out of power for awhile. The good news is that my wonderful husband purchased a generator (even though this city girl complained about it) a few years ago. With the generator we were able to keep the house warm, keep our food cold & run our sump pump in the basement. We could also turn on our TV & DVD player & use the microwave, or a light here or there. So we were warm & able to eat along with being able to ensure that our basement did not flood. I know the "sump pump" is a mystery to many of you, I did not understand it until recently myself. Somehow my smart husband designed a big hole in our garage that collects all the water that comes off the hillside, when that hole is full of water the sump pump drains it outside & our basement stays dry. A wonderful thing, but because of that someone had to be here at all times to make sure the generator was working to allow the pump to work. The first night we were out of power Jeremy was up every hour to drain it.

Our sweet neighbors offered to get a hotel room for us & if you know me well, you know that I LOVE hotels. I really wanted to go with the girls, but I decided to stay here with Jeremy, I felt bad leaving him here all alone & we really were doing okay.

Fast forward to Thursday night, still no power and no hopes of it anytime soon. Around 8pm, I was reading to the girls in Taylor's room and we heard a very loud sound. Jeremy went out to investigate & what he found was a large cedar that had come down just feet from our house. That was the good news, it did not land on the house (it would have crashed right into Taylor's bedroom), the bad news was that it landed on top of both of our cars.

There was nothing to do, but wait until morning and assess the damage. We all slept in our room Thursday night and it was a scary night, trees falling ALL NIGHT LONG, I was terrified!

All in all we think we lost about 10 trees, but praise the Lord, each of them fell away from our house.

Here is what we found on Friday morning...

The amazing thing is that Jeremy's car is just fine & mine has a very small dent...all things considered. This is one part of our property, the rest looked very similar, along with the entire road around the lake. Trees on people's cars, one house had a huge tree fall right into it, there were down power lines all over, really looked like a war zone around here.

Friday night was the highlight of the whole ordeal for me, we had our good friends over for a sleepover. They were without power as well, so why not make it a game night & we were happy to share our heat with others. I really felt bad that we were warm, while so many others were literally freezing! Jer went to pick up John, Christina and their 3 sweet kiddos. They got here, got settled, we started a game & somewhere in there found out their power came on. Believe it or not they still stayed overnight. We LOVED it, it was so fun to play games & as an extrovert I was seriously going crazy out here in the woods, not that we have lots of neighbors anyway, but most people left and it was a ghost town around here. So thankful for a fun night with really fun friends! Thanks for great memories friends!

Even the kids played games...

I think people think my kids are always great about pictures, not so, look at Tayor...

In the middle of the night we had about 2 hours of loud wind, the biggest bummer is that meant the power crews had to stop working temporarily & likely there was going to be more damage to the power lines...yikes!

Saturday morning breakfast, kind of like camping, but a little cleaner

Did I mention that we did not have hot water. It is now Saturday and we have not bathed since Wednesday... we literally stunk! We had water, but it was freezing & we do not have a wood stove to boil water. I did dishes once by boiling water in the microwave, but it took forever for the water to boil and I could hear the generator sucking gas while the microwave ran. Not a good use of the hundreds of dollars we spent to run the generator.

Saturday afternoon we ran over very quickly to the Bergs for showers (we had one hour before we had to be back for the sump pump). Jer had a quick hot shower, I gave the girls a nice long warm bath & I got to rinse myself in a luke warm shower before it turned cold. Sara felt so bad, but I was very thankful that three of the four of us got really clean & I did not smell anymore :)

Look how cute these three girls are, love them all so much!

Friday night was my highlight and Saturday night was my lowlight... We are now on day three of no power and the power company is now saying it could be sometime mid week before we have power again. I'm feeling bad for myself b/c everyone around us has power and I feel like PSE does not care about those of us way out in the boonies.

Also, I was feeling sad because I was supposed to be in LaConnor for the weekend with my Bible Study, a weekend I have been looking forward to for a long time. We obviously needed to cancel due to weather, but I was sad not to be with my Bible Study girls.

We had basically been without cell coverage this entire time too, not good for someone with fear issues. I kept thinking, if something happens, we can't get out & we can't call anyone. Saturday night we had cell coverage again, great right? Not so much, facebook, emails & blogs made me more depressed about being stuck in the woods in the dark with no hope of power anytime soon. I knew it was not a huge deal & we would have power again, but after several nights of not sleeping well I think I hit my max on Saturday night. We really were having a good time as a family, I was and still am sooooo thankful for Jeremy and the ways he took care of us. But the city girl in me was getting anxious about the situation.

Then I found out that my Bible Study had all gone out to dinner in Seattle Saturday night. They thought I was not able to get out & I don't know that I would have been able to & they did not want to rub it in my face that they were all going to be together... but I was so sad. It was hard that they were all together & I was not there. We have all talked and I know they love me & I love each of them, but to know I missed out on a night in the city with some of my best friends made me so sad!

Sunday morning was much better, I slept until 9:30, so wonderful. Strange to miss church, but I was still having a pity party and since Jer could not leave anyway, we decided to do home church. The girls led us in worship & several Bible Stories, it was darling. I was so thankful for this sweet time with my family.

Then about 1:00, 12 people from church (including most of the women from my Bible Study) showed up at our house. I felt really bad I made a scene the night before, but it was so nice to see each of them, so so nice!! They brought Thai food for us, coffee, donuts & hot chocolate for the girls & dr. pepper for me. I really did feel bad they drove so far to get down here, but I felt so loved & it made me so happy to see my dear friends!

Tay & Addie enjoying their thai food

The Jones, bless their hearts... parked probably 1/4 of a mile away (because they did not want to drive over a down power line) & hiked to our house, with hot coffee, a 5 year old, a 2 year old & an infant, not to mention the darling heels that Kristen was wearing. They arrived with warm smiles & we were so blessed!

Notice how cute all of these girls look straight from church, remember I have not had a hot shower since Wednesday, and I have done a little crying over the past 24 hours (I did not cry until Saturday night, I cried once Sunday morning, but other than that I was tear free, which is pretty much amazing), anyway, I'm not looking so great, but I had to post this pic of these girls that I love SOOOO much!

Monday around 11am I saw this truck & next to seeing Jesus himself...I cannot think of anything I would have rather seen at this moment in time.

Around noon on Monday which was our 5th consecutive day without power, our power came back on, thank you Jesus!

I want to be clear that this was not my favorite week of my life, but I am very well aware that I am soooo beyond blessed and even without power, I still had so much more than many other people. I don't want to make this experience sound dramatic... again it was not easy for this extroverted city girl, but Jeremy was wonderful the entire time & I am so thankful for all he does for me and our girls with and without power! I love you very much Jeremy, I'm sorry for my bad attitude on Saturday, thanks for loving me!

It's no secret that I love Seattle, but there are things I love about where I live and below is one of them. As Kevin would say "you don't get these views in Seattle". We had a beautiful eagle spend a couple hours in one of our trees down by the lake today. One thing I learned is that I am not a nature photographer, getting the Eagle to look at me was ten times harder than getting my girls to look at the camera!

This was the verse that I read dozens of times to keep me grounded & optimistic...

"For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God & not from us."

2 Corinthians 4:6-7

I also want to thank everyone that helped us & offered to help & for your prayers! Nancy & Christina, thank you for taking the girls on Monday so I had some time to myself & then some time to make sense of this house once the power did come on. Thank you to my parents that offered to come get the girls for the weekend, the Hays offered to come pick us up, Josh's brother even offered to drive from Wenatchee to pick the girls & I up and bring us over there. Gabe & Nancy offered us a hotel room at a hotel with a pool (perhaps the hardest thing to say no to). Lots of people offered hot showers, offered to do our laundry & offered to bring hot food over. I feel so thankful for our families, our church community & for the community of friends we have here in our neighborhood. We felt very loved & cared for! Thank you everyone!!