Saturday, November 21, 2015

The Epic Storm

Wow. We just had a massive windstorm hit our area last week. Trees uprooted, power lines knocked down, lots of damage...and lots of people still without power 4 days later. I guess we were fortunate to have our power back after just over 48 hours! 

We had an exciting 48 hrs without electricity. The storm was nuts. I have never experienced winds that strong. 70+ mph. When I went to pick the boys up from school, the light posts in the parking lot were swaying and I heard/watched a tree across the road snap and fall. It gets dark so early, so it was pretty difficult to see what was happening until morning, but our power went out right away so I started scrounging around for flashlights and candles. It turns out we really weren't prepared for an extended power outage (we are now at least more prepared!). 

In the morning, we looked out to mass destruction. Trees on people's roofs, power lines on the ground & across the roads, debris everywhere...but in our yard? Nothing! It was amazing. I cannot believe that we didn't have a single bit of damage from the storm (at least nothing we have noticed yet!). So, while we were cold and inconvenienced, we were SO FORTUNATE considering the craziness we saw. 

And really...we had fun! We did homework by candlelight (for 3 nights in a row), played cards, played hide & seek, slept all in the same room with our little heater, and the boys had an extra day off school. We had lots of friends offer to help us and offered to take us in until the power was back on, but we ended up staying home and switching our generator back and forth between the freezers and the refrigerator! We had power cords everywhere! Needless to say, I was ready for the power to come back on, but John had literally JUST gotten home with a bigger generator and heater that he had borrowed. He was not so happy about the timing! We were actually prepared to be without electricity for another 3-5 days from what the power company said, and unfortunately we have friends still without power...hopefully all the repairs will be done soon! We are supposed to be down in the mid-teens tonight...people need their heat!!!

Ender loved the heater!

Lights!!!

Sunday, November 1, 2015

Whirlwind Disney

We are currently on our way home (stuck in the Oakland airport because our flight is crazily delayed) from a super fun weekend Disneyland getaway! We had credit card points that needed to be used up, plus we've had a couple of months of insanity at the office, so it all added up to time for a vacation! Although I'm not sure I could call it a vacation since it was really just a crazy long weekend...but we all had so much fun and we definitely weren't ready to leave. 

We had amazingly warm (high 80's!) weather, along with minimal crowds at Disney and lots of fun Halloween decorations. We got to do the haunted mansion on Halloween, plus other fun Halloween "extras" on rides (like ghosts in Space Mountain!). We completely exhausted ourselves staying late both days we were in the park, but it was so worth it! Now, as we are in the middle of a 2.5 hour delay in Oakland, I'm kinda wondering if it really WAS worth it...but as I'm thinking back about the fun we had, it truly was! And I will try to remember that when we are driving home at 1:00 am...that feels like 2 am thanks to the time change last night.

Favorite rides:
Preston: Toy Story Mania and Buzz Lightyear
Bryton: California Screamin' and Matterhorn
Archer: California Screamin' and Tower of Terror

We also got in some swimming time at the hotel, and some shopping at Downtown Disney. Last time we did Disney, we all agreed that we should do a cruise next, but since that wasn't in the cards this time, maybe NEXT time will be a cruise!

Pictures pictures pictures!

Waiting for our flight

Exhausted boys. I need to remember to fly into Orange County airport instead of LAX. The money we saved was totally NOT worth it! By the time we got our bags and rental car, it was about 2 hours after our flight landed. Yuck. Poor kids were SO tired.

"Dressing up" for Halloween...Spider-Man, creeper, and Batman
Breakfast at Downtown Disney

The boys loved this dragon outside the Lego store

My view currently, except Archer is bopping around everywhere (fake sleeping in this pic). It's going to be a looooong night!

QOTD

P: Bryton do you know what R.I.P. stands for on a grave?
B: when it breaks!
P: what?! No. I said R.I.P. not W.I.B.!