Tuesday morning I was awake from about 4-6am listening to the wind howl outside. Just as Dan and I were about to wake up the kids for school at 6:30am, we were alerted school was cancelled due to the weather. During breakfast it was still blowing so hard that Alice kept saying, "I'm scared of the windys." After breakfast Dan left to walk around the neighborhood and assess the damage from the winds, and it was still pretty blustery. By 11:30am, the winds had died down enough that people were assembling to begin clean up. We were so blessed to not have any damage at all! Our neighbors, the Yeates, lost roof shingles and their trampoline narrowly missed both our house and the Johnson's. Our old house had two large trees come down in the back. The biggest one landed right between our old house and Jerry's. Paul Schmutz had a very large tree come down on this house which caused some damage. The kids worked on their online homework and thankfully, we had power and internet all day! Many others were not so lucky and were without power for days! Our lights did flicker and the internet struggled at times, but overall, everything was business as usual. My parents came down from Layton later in the day because their internet had been down all day and my dad needed to get something for work done. My mom and Ben made some jello gummies and the kids all played a piano piece or two for grandma. We decided to order pizza for dinner and I kept laundry going. That night, I started sleeping with ear plugs in as the wind was expected to pick up.
Wednesday the kids did not have school again and the tree clean-up continued. There wasn't any new damage done over night, but there was still so much to do. Dan estimated around 60+ trees came down just in our ward alone. McKenna even went to help with the clean up with the young women. I started cleaning my master bathroom and got about halfway done when OUR power went out! So weird. Alice made some funny faces while wearing a super hero mask. After lunch, I did some yard clean up of our own from about 2-4pm. The kids played in gopher dirt and made mohawk mountain. I mostly picked up leaves and a few big branches here and there. Dan was pretty much gone all day doing clean up around the ward. He stayed home that evening and bathed the girls while I went to Ben's baseball game where they won! It was pretty cold and windy there. Thankfully, our power came back on around 7pm. Mickelle spent the night that night because her power was out and she needed power for her sleep apnea CPAP machine.
Our old house
Other damage around the ward.
Thursday the kids were back to school like normal, for one day for the week. After school, Ben went to Henry's and I called Jonathan. Bethany and Anna had music and dance. We babysat Zaza Moulton for a bit and I made a Lemon Taragon chicken bow tie pasta that was a copycat recipe from Plates and Palets. I really liked it! The kids, not so much. We cleaned the basement and I talked a lot with Dan that night after he got home from another full day of clean up. He shared a pretty miraculous story. Dan was asked to drive the big truck/trailer of a neighbors, so he gave his car keys Steven Day so he could transport people to the next work site. After the next site, Steven realized the keys were no longer in his pocket and were undoubtedly now in the bottom of the trailer. A neighbor had a metal detector, so we decided they would use that to find the keys once the trailer had dumped everything. Miraculously, as the load was getting dumped Steven saw the keys the moment the load slid all the way out of the trailer. Amazing!! He even got a video of that moment... There were so many neighbors who stepped up to help throughout the week to work together!
Friday Ben had a student council meeting. Dan and I moved some plants out of two flower beds so we could sod over them and have a little less weeding. Caleb Arnold came over later to play with Ben. We had lunch and as Dan was putting the trailer back in place, it slipped and he accidentally broke his tail light. Later, Ben went to Mason and Cash Stewart's birthday party. They had a bounce house planned and were still waiting for their power to be restored from the wind storm. So they made rubber band bracelets while they waited. It all turned out great in the end! That night, for our date, Dan and I took our comforter to a laundromat and had dinner across the street at Smokin' Bones. We also ran errands to Michael's, At Home, and Autozone. I was looking for some nick knacks to put on our bathroom shelves. After little kids were in bed, we started watching "Hamilton" with McKenna. Mickelle spent the night again because she was still without power.
Saturday I ran a 5K outside and it felt good! After breakfast, Ben and Bethany did their art assignments and McKenna and Anna exercised in the basement gym. Dan took the older 4 to do some final tree clean up. Dan also mowed our lawn and caught another gopher! We had Desi, Mabel, Henry and Brittana here to play. McKenna and Brittana did a weird taste test experiment. :) Later, the three little girls got to have a bath in the big master bathroom tub. Anna had a movie night in the theater room with Desi, Mabel, Alex Boes, and McKayla Searle watching the live action Beauty and the Beast. McKenna went to a birthday party that evening for the Remington triplets and then we watched more "Hamilton."
Sunday we had home Sacrament and the kids played nice in the basement in the afternoon. They made their own little shops and then watched "Zootopia." We went on a walk after dinner and then had otter pops outside.
Monday after our normal morning, I went to see a doctor about my elbow pain I'd been having for two months! It had been hurting since the 4th of July after playing pickle ball. He said I sprained my elbow and to treat it he gave me a wrist brace to wear for 6 weeks. Cooper came to play and Ben played with Grace Whitchurch. I listened to the book "Them" and looked up other possible books for my next book club pick. Dan caught another gopher, the fourth one this Summer! Ben had a baseball game which was not so good, but he always says he has fun. McKenna lost a tooth that Dan pulled and we watched more "Hamilton."
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