(UPDATED - in my attempt to upload this while visiting a hot spot, I accidentally created a new page instead of a new post. This is the original information plus a few additional pictures and some info about Alice's bike crash last week. Scroll to the bottom for newest additions.)
We had a freak wind storm come through Friday night. It started in the midwest and surprised our area just after 11 pm Friday. I was worried it was a tornado. First the power went out. There was heat lightening flashing everywhere and then these tremendous winds hit. They lasted less than 30 minutes, but scared us into moving to the lower level of the house. Because our house is surrounded by large trees I've grown more anxious about trees hitting the house.
We did lose one dead pine tree. Fortunately it fell away from the house, but its hung in the neighbor's trees. We'll be hiring professionals to deal with it.
The neighbors behind us lost some huge limbs, one of which hit our fence breaking one post.
The tree in front of our house lost another section. Its days are numbered.
Across the street the neighbors lost a chunk of fence and some siding at the back corner of their house.
Our pile of debris - or at least part of it!
Alice has learned more than she ever wanted to know about power outages. We were without electricity for 67 hours. The worst part for Alice was not getting her phone time to China over the weekend. No power - no computers - no Skype - no calls. She asked if she could call from our cell phones and we said, "NO! Too Expensive!"
You might notice the large bandage on her knee. That's from a bad fall on her bicycle last Thursday. She asked if she could go see some classmates in the neighborhood which seemed like a step in the right direction - socializing with kids her age. I said yes, thinking she was going either one street over or at most 2 streets over (where the kids from her bus stop live). She couldn't find anyone home, so she decided to ride on the main road into our neighborhood to the house near the entrance where she knew a girl from school lived because the bus picked her up right in front of her house. She couldn't play so Alice started riding home, but lost control on the slight downhill stretch (she still hasn't mastered the brakes!). She took a big patch of skin off her knee, plus both elbows and both hands. She walked/rode home in near 90 degree heat (over ½ mile) all scraped up from her fall. It took us almost 24 hours to piece together most of the story. We just learned from a neighbor who was out walking that day and saw Alice looking for her friends that Alice didn't actually know which houses were her friends' homes so she was going door to door! And the people answering the door couldn't understand what she wanted. Yikes. Poor judgement on our part. We are very fortunate the situation didn't turn out much worse.
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