Yikes!!

On Sunday afternoon we experienced the remnants of hurricane Ike here in Cincinnati. We had severe wind storms that had gusts up to 75 miles an hour!! Trees have fallen all over the place, I think the only reason we didn't lose ours is because they already came down this summer! We lost power about 2:30 yesterday afternoon and it turned on here at the house at 7:30 am, the studio still doesn't have power and neither do a lot of people. Our dinner which was cooking by crockpot wasn't finished yet and we couldn't heat up the rest of the meal to go with it so we ended up having sandwiches for dinner. The boys had a bath by flashlight and we put them to sleep by 6:20 (it was dark enough and they didn't take a nap because the wind was so loud) Marc and I both stared at each other and said, "what do we do now??" Our friends Lane & Whitney came over to play "Clue" by candlelight & then we were in bed by 10 which never happens! The kids were up before 7 this morning and it was pitch black still! We ate cereal with lukewarm milk then the power turned on just in time for the kids to watch their favorite show "Little Einsteins"

It's nice sometimes to have the power out for a little while because you can't just veg in front of the tv or computer and it's fun for the kids to play with the flashlights, but I was sure happy when it came back! I was really worried about the food in the freezer and fridge, but I think most of it survived (thank goodness!). I'm grateful for cell phones but still felt helpless when the battery died and I couldn't charge it. It's amazing how the panic starts to kick in when you realize that you can't communicate with anyone unless you drive over to their house and do it in person. I can't imagine what it would have been like in the actual hurricane with the wind and the water and losing power for DAYS. It was scary watching that wind rip the trees around and hearing them snap and crash, I'm just grateful we weren't hit any harder. My thoughts and prayers go out to those who were in the thick of the storm and had everything destroyed. I live in a false sense of security and this makes me realize that I am definitely not as prepared as I need to be for emergencies...here's to being more prepared!