Hurricane Hermine

I have talked about doing a post about our "adventure" with

Hurricane Hermine, but hadn't.  So, I thought today would be

a good day to show the pictures - as few as there are.

We had been following this storm for a couple of weeks and the

weather men could not decided where it was going to go.  First they said that it would go into Texas, then into Tampa. then into Louisiana, then back to Tampa, then the Panhandle of Florida.  Well, it actually came in between Apalachicola Bay and Tallahassee - which put us on the east side of the storm.  When it made landfall late Thursday night it was a Cat 1 storm but it sure did do quite a bit of damage.  We woke up sometime in the middle of the night (I think around 1 AM) with no power.  The wind was howling and it was pouring down rain.  Dan and I got up and I tried to look at the radar on my phone, but couldn't get a signal.  Anyway, we ended up sleeping (what little sleep we got) in the family room - Dan in his recliner and I was on the sectional.

When we got up Friday morning, Dan went and got the small generator out of the garage and brought it around to the back porch.   He tried and tried to get it started but couldn't.  I was thinking it was going to be a long hot day - but our friends were out riding around in their golf cart and stopped by and Bud and Dan were able to get the generator started.  I made a pot of coffee (we had water) and brought the coffee pot out on the porch - plugged it in and made us a pot of coffee.  (Things were looking up)  Dan brought around the garage fan, plugged it in along with the refrigerator and we were pretty much okay.

We decided to ride around on the golf cart and see how much damage there was.  The only thing that we could find at our house was a fascia board down - but Dan fixed it with no trouble by just nailing it back up.

I didn't take a lot of pictures - there were some trees down in the road

and one of the rental units had a tree fall on the back storage area.

No one was hurt and the village worked with the people to rescue their belongings until they could get the unit fixed.

There were some signs down and a couple of homes were hit by falling trees, but nothing that damaged the homes more than the picture above.

There were all kinds of rumors about when we would be power back on - the nursing home/assisted living units had power back by the middle of Friday morning - then the apartments, Village Square, and mobile home park got there's back by about 1 in the afternoon.  We, meaning the homes in River Woods, got ours back around 6 Friday night.  Those homes outside the village didn't get power back until sometime late Saturday/early Sunday.

My daughter and son-in-law had closed on their new house on Friday and we were suppose to get the girls for the week so they could get all moved in.  Well, we went back and forth since we didn't have power.  I didn't mind keeping them even without power BUT I had no way to feed them.  Anyway, with the power coming back on Friday we met my daughter in Ocala (about 1/2 way for both of us) and picked up the girls.

It's been about three/four weeks since the storm and almost everything is back to "normal".  Almost all the trees that came down are cut up and hauled away, there are still dead limbs up high and the next big thunderstorm to come through should knock all those down. 

I can say that I was extremely thankful that we had all those dead pine trees removed.  I'm not sure our new family room would have survived without some damage.

I'm hoping this is the only storm that we will go through - but I'm going to have Dan check and run the generator at least once a month just in case.

Blog's been a little quiet

Things have been quiet here on the blog for the last week or so because:

1. Hurricane Hermine (will post all about that on later)

2.  The most adorable little girls EVER!!!

We kept the girls for eight days starting the Saturday after the hurricane and meeting their dad on this past Sunday.

It was a lot of fun and we had many adventures, but BOY was I tired!!!  I forgot how tiring it is to keep little ones day in and day out - especially at age four and two!

We met their mom down in Ocala on Saturday (it's about half way for both of us) and had lunch at McDonald's before loading all their stuff into my car (in the rain) and heading for home.  Saturday afternoon was pretty laid back as they became familiar with the house and checking out the videos they could watch.

 Sunday I fixed a big lunch and the girls Grump Pa and Aunt Tul came down from Cuthbert Georgia for the day.  Aunt Tul had driven down to her dad's from Nashville on Saturday and headed back home Tuesday morning I think.  Anyway, mom came and had lunch with us too - Chicken, squash and zuccini, corn on the cob, mac and cheese, sweet potatoes, green beans w/ new potatoes, and apple pie with ice cream for dessert.  Grump Pa brought down the pool the girls had at his house for Lorelai's birthday in June and it was used during the week.  The girls had fun coloring and playing with Aunt Tul.

Monday was Labor Day and we went down to the "big" outdoor pool - as it was opened since it was a holiday.  The girls had a really good time swimming and playing in the pool.

Tuesday was a quiet day (as quiet as it gets with a four and two year old in the house), but they played with their toys, colored lots of pictures, played with stickers, watched a movie, and went for lots of golf cart rides.

Wednesday we played in their little pool and went to the Dollar Store to pick up some stuff - why do I mention that?  Well, don't ever go to the Dollar Store will little ones if you don't intend to spend more money then you think.  HaHa!!

Thursday afternoon we decided to go and feed the fish - that was a great hit - we had to go everyday in the afternoon as they really enjoyed feeding the koi fish.  There are at least a hundred in the pond by the nursing home and the girls had such an awesome time feeding them and watching them.

Friday we went next door for a tea party.

They really enjoyed themselves.

(Thanks Ms. Patty)

Saturday was playing at home again - and getting all the laundry done and packing up all the toys - searching the house to make sure you don't forget anything.

Sunday morning we were up pretty early and loaded in the car by eight - heading back to Ocala to meet the girls daddy, while mommy stayed home unpacking boxes.

Dan and I had such a great time with the girls, but I sure was tired when we got back home Sunday afternoon.  I just spent the rest of the day lying on the couch watching football, but I wouldn't trade the memories that we made for anything.

Love these girls!!!!

Precious babies!