Riding out the Storm

[Ann Kendig]

Last night was one loooong night.   I checked the weather and saw there were thunderstorms heading our way...again.  Ugh, I hate storms!!!  I admit it, I'm a big baby when it comes to storms, always have been.  I thought this year I would be safer from the big, bad storms.  We have no basement where we live and I have been pushing DH to move so we could have a little bigger house, a nice sized yard for the doods AND you guessed it, a basement!!   We had some land in the country and decided not to build on it, so we sold it.  That process started last November.  Then we put our house up for sale, got a contract on it pretty quickly and then the sale fell through.  *sigh*  

I was really hoping to be moved, or close to it, before tornado season.  Last year, in October, an F2 tornado hit Cridersville, a town a little over 8 miles down the road from us.  No one was hurt badly.  This year at the end of April a F2 tornado hit Celina, the town I lived in before I moved here.  It destroyed the Aldi's I used to shop in.  : (   Again, no serious injuries, thank goodness!!  I go through Celina often on the way to visit my mother so I was able to drive around and see the damage done.  I AM READY TO MOVE NOW!!

 

Whenever these bad storms hit my DH is very seldom at home and I have to ride it out alone with Sheba and Duke.  This time we had an additional passanger to ride out the storm with us, our new foster dog, Molly.  DH works days usually but he had a meeting to go to so he adjusted his hours so he would work through the evening.  Yep, we were alone again.  

 

About 7 pm things started to get a little scary.  I grabbed the leashes and hooked them to the dogs collars.  Sheba and Duke laid around and snoozed but Molly followed me everywhere.  She didn't care for the thunder much.  A tornado warning was issued and the sirens were blaring.   (I thought the warning was only till 7:30 but I was wrong, it was until 8pm a whole hour!)   In April, when the tornado hit Celina, there were tornado warnings here but it didn't look as bad outside so I didn't worry as much.  About 7:30 it started getting dark very quickly!  I started pulling all kinds of junk out of the closet and throwing it in the hallway.  I looked out the window that faced west and all at once I was slammed with some very strong winds!  (I can see why they tell you to stay away from windows during bad weather..duh.)  I shut the window, grabbed the dogs and off to the closet we went.  Sheba and Duke entered quickly and laid down, no problem.  Molly did not want to go in the closet.  There wasn't much room to maneuver so I had to push this 90 lb. dood into the closet.  All the while my DH and I are sending texts back and forth.   This photo was taken with my cell phone just before I climbed in...

So, here I  am in a teeny, tiny, hot closet with 3 panting doods. I am holding a sleeping bag over our heads but trying not to make an already very uncomfortable situation more unbearable by smothering us in the hot closet. I could hear rain and possibly some hail hitting the metal furnace vent thing that exits through the roof.  The wind was blowing pretty hard.  I am also hearing from the TV (that I have cranked up), "If you wait to take cover it may be to late" and that the storm was really bad between certain mile markers off I 75.  I feet a bit better as it is about 5 mile markers away from us. Meanwhile, I got a text from DH telling me he loved me.  : ) 

About 8 pm we climbed out of the closet, except for Molly who couldn't understand why I was making her do all these crazy things.  After some prompting she came out and we all went into the kitchen so the dogs could get a nice long drink of water.  I texted my hubby that we were OK and the storm was to hit his area around 8:38.  He texted back that they were getting some rain and some strong winds.  The worst part of the storm was more south of where he was.  

Thankfully, we were fine and the storm passed over without any damage or injuries.   Whew!   Something like this really gets me thinking about how prepared I am for bad weather.  I'm going to make up a survival kit and I'm taking it to the house I hope to move into soon....WITH A BASEMENT!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Joanne ~ Spud*]

here is a game for you to play the next time you are hiding out in the closet. 

Storm Chasers

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

These are beautiful photos.

[Joanne ~ Spud*]

Last  night,  no alarms  :)

[Joanne ~ Spud*]

Opps.  I deleted the cloud picture because the comments I said about the tail of the clouds...well I need to go find one of my books and recheck my facts.

I'll put the cloud picture back up when I get on the other computer.  Really, the cloud watching has been Wonderful. Yes you can find something good in something bad--almost always.

Last night, it was calmer.  We all got some sleep.   

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Ann, Joanne, I am so sorry about those storms.  It must be awful.  I hope the weekend nice-weather prediction comes true for both of you.

[F, Calla & Luca]

Sorry to hear about all this awful weather. Joanne, that is a gorgeous cloud picture!

[Ann Kendig]

Oh, a storm just blew through a little while ago but it wasn't as severe as last night.  Just some rain, wind and VERY dark skies.  Don't know what the rest of the evening holds.  Supposed to be a nice weekend!!!  YAY!!!!!

[Ann Kendig]

Joanne - Yesterday it stormed every couple of hours!  Bad!  Sirens were going off during one of the storms.  Then it stormed again and got hail maybe quarter size.  Later it rained HARD and we couldn't see across the field from our window.  Trees looked like they were going to blow over in the yard!  Thank goodness Mike was home.  These storms went on from around 4pm to 1am.  I'll bet it stormed 5 times.  I may just jump on to that ark and float your way, you have a basement!!!  You're right, many of us are so blessed to be safe.

[Joanne ~ Spud*]

56 out of 62 days have rained.  We are building an Arc Ann, come on up.  No, why would you come here, when it is the same as it is there.  But we have a basement.   Starlit refuses to go down there so we have her training collar and leash ready at the top of the steps just in case we have to hurry.  12 tornadoes in 3 days ( that they know about).  We are all very lucky.  

 

[Paul & Michele]

I am so glad you are all safe.  I hate the storms too.  I am originally from NY but now live in KS.  I just told my husband tonight how glad I am that we have a basement.  I read once to put a whistle where you go in bad storms so if you get trapped you can blow it and the rescuers would be able to hear you and find you.  I hope you are able to find a home with a basement soon, I have to admit I still get worried with the bad weather but it's nice to know I can get underground.