The Aftermath

Pretty dramatic title, huh?  :)  Actually, for us, the storm was just fun.  Praise the Lord for a break.  However, I wish so many others didn't have such a rough time from it.  It is kind of interesting that we came out so unscathed, since not too far in one direction (Baltimore) they had more than 11 inches of rain, and not too far in another direction (extreme western MD) they had 24 inches of snow.  We had no snow (girls are very disappointed about that) and about 5 inches of rain.  Quite a bit of wind during the night (sounded to me like a blizzard) but no big damage.  We did lose power last night, and that lasted until 3:15 this afternoon, but that just made it more of an adventure.  Only had branches down in our yard and MANY leaves.  Chad walked around the neighborhood and saw 3 or 4 trees down, including the one that was on our power line.

So, no school for 2 days, but we're on for tomorrow.  Can't believe we've already used up 2 of our 5 snow days and it's not even November yet.  In fact, those 2 weren't even for snow.

Since the power was off for most of the night, a couple of the kids got us up-- can't see to go to the bathroom, etc.  Then, in the morning, Micah and Jenna walked around the house and counted things that didn't work.  I think they got up to 50ish before they quit.  Probably was a good way for him to find out what he couldn't use today!  This was one of the first times Micah remembers a power outtage. 

Among the "can't use" items are our toilets and sinks, since our well pump won't run without power.  Thankfully, this time, we had buckets of water ready.  Ever since Puerto Rico, I've known how to flush a toilet with a bucket of water, but no one else can figure it out yet.  So I was busy flushing toilets for everyone. 

We hadn't had to use heat much this fall yet; and we hadn't started the woodstove at all.  Today was the day, tho.  It was pretty chilly out, so the house temp kept going down.  By lunchtime, we were starting to get pretty uncomfortable, so Chad got it going.  Sure made it nice to do the puzzle down by the woodstove!  Of course, it's a little rough doing a puzzle by candlelight and kinda dim daylight.  Good thing the girls chose a brightly colored puzzle.

We played games and the girls drew and played quite a bit of piano.  Then, after the power came on, we enjoyed a hot supper (before the power came back on, we were considering heading up to Hagerstown for supper, but that would have been a little rough since none of us have had showers), watched an American Girl movie, and I made more funnel cakes.  Maybe this storm will always be connected to funnel cakes in our minds. 

Almanac says we're in for a doozy of a winter.  We all kinda hope so, since we feel like we got gypped last year.  One year ago tomorrow was when we had the only snow of the winter.  Well, actually, it wasn't even winter yet.  About 6 inches on Halloween, and then no more all winter.

Katie in action on the GA varsity volleyball team!

 

Watch out, Katie can serve! ...

http://youtu.be/zlGpL4sKJzw

 

 

Watch out, Katie can kill! ...

http://youtu.be/MmYeetlQmWs

Katie's volleyball season just ended.  Because of the stress level, we are glad (it's tough to get her homework and piano and guitar and quizzing done when she gets home at 6:30 or 8 or 9pm!), but she really enjoys volleyball.  She didn't play a ton this year, since she was a 9th grader on the varsity team; because of that, she enjoyed the practices more than the games.  We got some video of great playing here-- sorry the videography is not so great.  I think maybe Micah was crawling all over us at that point.  This was actually not an official game (the season was finished)-- it was a game organized by SGA to benefit breast cancer awareness... thus the pink shirts.  

Storm Prep

FUN day ahead!  School got cancelled because of the hurricane weather forecast.  Chad's still going in shortly since tomorrow is payday, and the weather is more likely to be wild tomorrow.  So far, we've just had some mild rain.

So, everyone was happy to sleep in.  We made and ate cinnamon muffins.  Chose a jigsaw puzzle for a little later.  Jenna's playing Christmas songs on the piano, wishing we could put up our Christmas decorations.

We did some storm prep.  Took in the deck chairs and fall decor.  Filled some buckets with water so we can flush our toilets if the power goes out.  Filled water bottles so we have drinking water.  Have lots of candles.  Now we'll see what happens.

Chutes

This has been one of the games of the week.  Chutes and Ladders.  Maybe my all-time least favorite game!  (OK, maybe not.  I just remembered Scrabble)  Good thing there are usually enough other people around to play this with Micah.  During the school day, I can usually convince him to do other things with me, and then wait until Daddy and the girls come home to play Chutes and Ladders.  He LOVES this-- will happily play it several times in a day.  He loves many, many games.  When the girls were this age, they were into books or crafts or puzzles, but, for at least a year, he's been into games.  And can honestly beat me at several of them.  We played 3 rounds of Blink this morning-- he won 2 of them. His other favorite game this week is Bingo.  Chad got a cool Bingo kit with balls and a spinning gerbil cage thing.  Micah loves to do all sorts of variations of activities with the numbered balls-- sometimes by himself and sometimes with others.

Grandparents Day

Grandparents Day was last week.  Since Claire's grandparents are in MI and CA, we asked George and Cheryl to come instead.  They are the best pretend grandparents ever! :)  Claire very much enjoyed going to Ryans with them for lunch.

Fall Festival

 Our church held a fall festival at an area "farm".  I think they were expecting about 300 people.  There had to have been more than 1,000 . It was nuts.  Kids still had fun, tho

 Hay/wagon ride.

 Tube rolling down the hill

Katie and Jenna and I enjoyed watching people, eating nachos and hot chocolate.

Claire's Bday

 Claire turned 8 a few weeks ago!  It hit on a pretty busy day, so we had a little party for her before school.

 One of her new favorite desserts-- cherry cake

 One of her favorite parts of the day-- graduating from a booster seat in the car.

 Her friend Rachel came over on Fri pm.

Sweet Claire!  Happy birthday!

Accountant in Training

Micah figured out how to subtract numbers like 6-8.  He's pretty accurately coming up with the correct negative number answers.

This morning, he used the pieces from two number board puzzles to make numbers.  He methodically used a combination of the numbers to count up to 100.

And he also said his ABC's backwards this morning.  Hardly any pausing.  I wish he'd start reading (it would really help with our MI trips!) but I'm not going to push it.  Someday it'll click.

HE'S FORTY!

Well, the big day arrived.  Yesterday, Chad turned 40.  Of course, his actual birth didn't take place until 9:22 pm, so all day he didn't really FEEL 40.  Not until 9:22pm.

He got several cards from friends and family (and I know some more are in the mail), and he had lots of fun opening them.  Thanks to all of you who joined in the celebration!

His bday hit a Sunday, and Sundays during the school year are pretty busy for us; so we just sneaked a few fun things in.  At ABF, one of our friends made him a huge, round cake and another friend brought balloons.  I made sure we had a black tablecloth and black plates/napkins.  There were lots of good "old" jokes.  Garfields for lunch-- delicious food and kids eat free on Sundays (yippee!).  Home for carrot cake and candles and singing, and a quick nap. 

He had several hours to himself (sounds like a treat to me!) while the rest of us went to quizzing and children's choir.  Then we gave him a few presents.  2 of which were DVDs (Cosby Show and Tom and Jerry).  Since there's no school today !!!, we stayed up late and watched some of each.  Best part was listening to Micah laugh. :)

Today we're just hanging out and enjoying Micah's half-birthday.  Had considered a trip to Baltimore, but it's cold and wet.  Decided we needed a home day more.

Claire's race

Last weekend, Chad and Claire went to the Cedar Ridge 5K Chase.  Claire ran the 1K "fun run" and Chad did the 5K.  I think she came in last, but she sure had fun doing it.  What a sweetie!  We love our Claire.

Chad's CO Jaunt

Chad was very excited to be able to take a long weekend trip to CO.  The plan was to meet up with Nate at Jer's.  It also worked out that Don and Anita were able to be there, so they had a terrific family time.

 Some gorgeous hikes

 Wonderful food-- I think this was the vegetable lasagna Danielle cooked.  Plus, they got to use one of the Porches places, Jer's boss offered it for free.

 An Alpine slide Chad, Nate, and Jer went down.  I think it was almost a 2 minute trip going down.  Another perk of Jer's concierge job-- he had coupons toward this slide.

 Tennis with all 6 of them.

 Aspens looking really pretty

Wingert Reunion

Wingert reunion at Myron and Denise's.  Great to catch up with people!  Well-planned with a family competition.  (Wingerts thoroughly lost to Hesses and Lehmans, BTW-- but it was lots of fun)

All the sort-of in-town people made it.  Missing Nate's family, Jer's family, and Greg's family