Monday, June 23, 2008

Saturday we went to buy more fixer-upper stuff.
Sunday we painted, patched, cleaned and had trees that were blown over cleared.
I believe we will some day get back to normal. Though all of my trees are gone. We have a few that made it through the storm but not many that offer much for shade...and in Kansas in the summer, you want shade.

Last evening some of the neighbors came over with their children. Both neighbors will have to have their homes completely replaced (we live in a rural setting). The neighbors to the west are living in theirs until they can get it replaced. The neighbors to the south have had to bulldoze their home, they are currently living with relatives. Anyway, the children provided comic relief. They were determined to build a raft out of sticks and needed some rope. Reminded me of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. I am not sure the raft was built, but they came back soaked to the armpits, and muddy. We got out hotels soaps, the garden hose and towels and they washed themselves and their clothes all at once. They had a great time!

Today more painting, pulling out carpets, cleaning...as life goes on.

Another day of tornado activity, or replacement activity. Our roof is finally repaired. I had to go look at carpet and was asked to get 15' wide. The carpet I liked was only 12' wide so now I am not sure what to do...buy what I don't like or keep looking.

I have learned somethings through this. I choose to live in tornado alley, I expect severe weather as part of my life. I accept those facts and I don't expect the government or any other agency to accept responsibility for my choice to live here. I have a storm cellar and I know it is the safest place for us. I have a mess to clean up and it will get done. It may take longer than I would like but that is to be expected.

All of the mess is just STUFF, all of the lives in our community were spared. The worse thing to happen was stitches and bruises. Life goes on whether we are ready or not. I am thankful for family and friends - for they are the most important things in life.

June 19, 2008

It has been three weeks since the tornado hit our home and I still don't think we are on the way to recovery. While it didn't totally destroy the house itself, it made a huge mess of what was here. My daughter's room even had sheet metal sitting on the bed, wrapped in her curtain. I am thankful that she was not in the room, she was visiting a friend in town and was safe.

All of us are alive, including the dogs. We were in the storm cellar in time, if we had still been in the house I think we would have survived the tornado, but maybe not the flying debris that comes with it. There were some pretty scarey things inside the house when we returned. Glass embedded in walls, there was about a 12 inch shard (looked like a pointy boomerang) sticking in my daughter's bedroom door.

All of our carpeting has to be replaced as it is full of glass and other debris. I am not sure we would have spent so many hours vacuuming up the glass if we had known. Thanks goodness for insurance. Every storm window in the house but three were busted out. Three inside windows were also completely destroyed.

Our garage and workshed were destroyed. The garage was leaning on my car, though no glass was broken in it. My daughter's car lost three windows. It appears to have sucked the dashboard loose too. The truck had a coffee can up under the bedliner. We don't drink coffee.

My daughter asked the other day if the tornado was IN our house...well, how do you answer that. It sure made a mess. I know this is not how I planned to spend my summer break. Cleaning up a mess I didn't make.