The Derecho

 Oh, I am so thankful to be writing this post today with POWER! We are some of the lucky ones who already have power restored from the Derecho. 

Have you ever had one of those? I hadn't. But it's a "widespread, long-lived, straight-line wind storm with hurricane-force winds."

Monday started out pretty great. A small group gathered together for our first rosary in forever. I got to hold a tiny squishy baby who is the most living miracle I've ever had the pleasure to lay eyes on. I have prayed for this little man specifically since his momma got a positive test (and for the idea of him for even longer than that!) so it was so wonderful to hold him! 

We talked, we played, we prayed and I brought home two very dirty sweaty children. After we had lunch I popped M into the shower and then I popped C in right after. I told C he needed to get out, and he commented on how it was getting dark. I also really wanted to shower and considered hopping in for a second, then decided that I should probably wait since I could see the darkness approaching. There was a severe thunderstorm warning across the river so I decided it maybe wasn't a good idea.

We all went downstairs and M ran our to close our gate since I didn't want it waving around in the storm. She came back in and we were standing on the three-season porch together when a huge gust of wind went through. It was like nothing I'd ever seen and it had been perfectly still when M was outside. 

I told the kids they needed to go to the basement. I brought them down with a flashlight and LED lantern just in case and then I came back up. 

Husband had texted that his work had them sheltering in the stairwell. And some branches fell in the yard. I sent a text out with a picture. Then I ran out and moved our grill so it wasn't in the middle of the patio. This turned out to be a good move!

And I was watching... and it just kept getting worse. More and more things were flying through the air. Branches, huge ones were falling. We lost power at 1:49. 

By 3:00 things had calmed down enough that I let the kids come upstairs. It was still windy and drizzly but not crazy. Neighbors were outside and surveying. 

See that piece of splintered wood? It was standing completely vertical and jammed into the ground on a point! 

We were honestly so lucky! These huge branches were long and heavy but it wasn't the whole tree! Our house sustained no major damage. The gutter on the side of our garage got bent. But there were a lot of shingles in our yard that are not ours! And there was a lot of widespread damage. In our town, the top recorded wind speed was 86 mph. And I believe it. 

Monday was National S'mores Day, and we celebrated without power because why not? We also grilled the steak I was saving because no way I was going to let that go to waste. 

The most nerve-wracking part was that one branch pulled out the electric wires from our house to the garage. Our neighbor is a firefighter and he came and talked to me about how when the power was restored it could arc and start a fire so we should "keep an eye on it." Ahahaha. Or worry about it is more like it. 

We packed a "go bag" just in the absolute worst-case scenario and went to bed. 

Husband took a bag of meat and our strawberries into work yesterday to put in those freezers. He came home with ice and a Yeti cooler to keep the rest of the stuff in the freezer okay. I had already tossed what needed to go from the fridge and kitchen freezer. (The chest freezer was holding very well!) 

The power came back on last night at 10:45 so almost exactly 33 hours later. Not too shabby. There are still a lot of people here in town without power so we are very fortunate! 

With little to no warning, this Derecho could have been so much worse. Not surprisingly for 2020 everyone has been talking about how this storm, causing so much damage is "unprecedented." Just like everything else. The good news is I fully forgot there was a virus for about 24 hours! So that was actually kind of refreshing. 

Anyway, yay for power!