We Survived!

Well, I had a completely different post planned for today, but with recent weather events I had no time to get it up, so today you’re going to get something else instead.

How I felt about the weather

As you probably already saw from my post yesterday or my posts from Instagram, we had some really bad weather come through yesterday which also happened to be my birthday.  The weather team was calling for multiple large tornadoes that stay on the ground for long periods of time, SOFTBALL sized hail (I had no clue they could even get that big), and straight line winds.  And to top it all off, we were supposed to get three or four rounds so it was an all day event.  Jim Cantore from The Weather Channel was even in our area, and you know that’s never a good sign.

Because of the scary predictions, all schools were closed yesterday as well as our local government, and our mayor urged all companies to make the right decision and let employees stay home.  My work did not close nor did Brian’s, but due to the fact that our kids were out of school, I made the decision to stay home.  I also realized early on that my anxiety was going to be through the roof, so I begged Brian to stay home as well.  Fortunately he works for an amazing company and they had no problem with it even though he had an important all day meeting.  He was able to work from home via conference call and I was so grateful.

Another thing that I am grateful for today?  The fact that all of the severe weather just split and went completely around our city.  We had one wave that came through around 4 AM and it brought torrential rains, thunder and lightning, and some pebble sized hail, and then we had another wave just before lunch that brought about some more rain and thunder, but other than that, all of the major hail, wind damage, and tornadoes went just south of us and just north of us. 

One of the cities just south of us supposedly had six tornadoes touch down.  And there was also supposedly a huge tornado (1/2 mile to a mile wide) on the ground for a long time just north of us.  Some people around us experienced tennis ball sized hail, and plenty of people around us no longer have homes to go home to as they were destroyed by tornadoes and fallen trees. 

I am so, so incredibly thankful that our city managed to avoid the worst of it and that all of our loved ones are safe and sound.

We even had a chance in the evening to do a little bit of celebrating since it was my birthday!  B was able to get his hands on the Nikes that I’ve been wanting, and he also got the stair stepper that I’ve been wanting.  I’m a happy girl!

My parents also knew how anxious I was about the weather, so they stopped by and surprised me with some “sunshine” since I didn’t get any real sunshine for my birthday.  I am just so thankful to have them in my life.

So even though my birthday wasn’t exactly what I had envisioned, it did end up being pretty great.  I got to spend the day with my babies while hubs worked in the other room and NOT across town… we watched Beauty and the Beast, played some games, read some books, and did lots of snuggling… and more importantly, our prayers were answered and we were kept safe and dry.

Please keep everyone in your prayers who were not as fortunate as we were.  There is going to be a long road ahead for them.

*Linking up with Home of Malones for Thoughts for Thursday.