June 2012 Wind Storm

Eight days ago, a storm with 85 mph winds blasted it's way into Ohio. It was actually a short-lived storm, but it was powerful and left it's mark. Praise to God, we were all safe. I have since heard of many people who lost their homes and/or were injured themselves. Thankfully, all we lost was an umbrella stand, a swingset and a small area of fencing. 

The metal stand was bent right in half. Crazy!

Our new-to-us swingset that was just bought a few weeks ago. Bummer!

The swingset fell over on top of the slide. Even if we could salvage the swingset, replacing the slide would cost us nearly half of what we paid for the whole swingset.

Dan isn't too bummed to see this fencing go, but I liked that it gave us a little bit of privacy from our neighbors when we were sitting at our table.
And yes, that's Ellie in the background...in Luke's pajamas.

Our electricity went out for 46 hours after the storm, came back on for one day, and then went out again for another day. Thankfully, everything in our deep freezer stayed frozen and we only lost a few things in our fridge/freezer. The second time our power went out, my mom and dad were gracious enough to have 5 additional roommates for a night. This preggo was very thankful! Every day that our power was out, the temperatures were over 90 degrees outside....so hot! And every one in our family has a hard time sleeping in the heat.

We have a lot to be thankful for. We are thankful to God for protecting us and our home from harm. We are thankful for family who open their doors and share their resources. We are thankful the power outage lasted only 3 days, instead of the possible 7-8 that AEP intially estimated. We are thankful to all the workers who worked outside in the terrible heat trying their best to restore power to people. We are thankful that we had minimal damage, and that the swingset wasn't brand new. We are thankful for electricity! I don't now how women ever cared for their children AND did all their chores by hand. They probably just had a lot less stuff, but all I know is that I'm really thankful for washers, dryers, dishwashers and fridges!