Hurricane Matthew

Who would've guessed the safest place to be in a hurricane was right on the coast? But that's exactly what happened over the weekend. That's how I felt, and as I noticed at work today, that's clearly how many people felt. Although all of our yards have large piles of debris and look like this

and uprooted trees are rather ubiquitous since the only ones that have been cleared were blocking roads and power lines,

we all recognize how lucky we were.

I'm used to people telling storm stories, whether from tropical weather or winter storms, where everyone tells how bad they had it. But this was the exact opposite. Everyone downplayed their stories in gratitude, until some of them sounded reminiscent of the Black Knight in Monty Python. "Our power was out for 24 hours and our water was out for 16 hours, but no big deal." "A coworker is stranded in Lumberton and is running out of food and water, but at least the flood water isn't getting to her house." Just a flesh wound.

For us the storm adventure first began last Sunday, October 2 when I checked the weather on my phone before getting out of bed in the morning and happened to notice something kinda icky brewing. Although I typically ignore tropical weather until it gets much closer, this one seemed to suck me in, and after living here for nearly 9 years, I found myself dutifully checking for updates every 4 hours. I couldn't let it go.

On Tuesday afternoon things got real when the afternoon update suddenly showed Wilmington getting a direct hit from a strong Category 2 storm. Yikearooni. That's when UNCW decided to evacuate students by noon on Thursday. Tuesday night while the boys were at karate I decided to make a supply run, just in case the forecast didn't change, and people went crazy at the store later in the week. I found Target already out of cases of water. Thankfully the grocery store was much better prepared and had filled all of the perimeter aisles with pallets of bottled water.

After all the Tuesday drama, the forecast looked much better Wednesday and Thursday. Lots and lots and lots of rain, but for the most part, Wilmington can handle that. Our soil is sand, which is lousy for gardening, but great for draining heavy rain. And the neighborhoods built after Hurricane Floyd have retention ponds and drainage ditches and other modifications to help manage storm water.

Thursday night as I was going to bed I got a voicemail from the power company saying to "anticipate prolonged power outages." I had never gotten a message like this before and didn't know if it was ominous or comical given that it arrived at 10:30 and the first bands of heavy rain arrived around 3am Friday morning and didn't let up until around 4:30. Not exactly a lot of time to prepare if you hadn't done so already!

I had to work Friday morning, and campus was mostly shut down with the students all evacuated. 

There was no Subway to eat

 

and no Jamba Juice to drink.

 

The forecast was for 12 - 18" of rain and while Wilmington IS built for rain, the amount of standing water already on the ground was a bit disconcerting. 

 

Everything changed around 11am when everyone's cell phones began vibrating madly. Unexpectedly, Wilmington had just been upgraded to a hurricane warning. The rains looked like they would be mostly to the west, but we were anticipating heavier winds. Work was suddenly a flurry of activity as we went to really close up show.

UNCW closed at noon on Friday. Given the storm upgrade, when I got home, Jeff and I went to work on the yard. While we were busy moving everything to the garage, the kids played a giant game of Dungeons and Dragons with our tile floors and their stuffed animals.

 

Friday afternoon was relatively quiet as we waited for Matthew to arrive in earnest. When Natalia learned I had the afternoon off from work, she planned a flurry of activities for me to do with her, and we managed to get in the first of many Mommy-Talia crafts.

Saturday morning we woke up to a tornado warning. I spent so long in bed contemplating what to do, that the warning thankfully expired before I had to take action. At that point I was wide awake, so I moved on to the delicious task of using up as much perishable food as possible before we lost power.  So we had chocolate chip pancakes and blueberry smoothies for breakfast, then Natalia and I made banana bread. The power flickered a few times while the banana bread was baking, but it was able to finish baking. 

 

While we had power, I also worked on cleaning the house, and while I cleaned, the kids painted. 

 

We lost power around 1:45 in the afternoon, while watching NC State play football in abysmal conditions (although it was fun to watch the waves of water come off the field any time someone was tackled). Amazingly, our power was only off for about 90 minutes.

Things actually improved in the late afternoon, but around dinnertime the winds began picking up again, and by 7pm the house was shaking and our front door, which is recessed and protected by a large porch, was shaking. There is a very tall tree in our backyard that makes me nervous, so to keep the kids away from it and the wall of glass windows in our living room in the back of the house, I had a sleepover with the kids in the girls' room on Saturday night. Despite the storm noise, the kids actually slept great. I think they were just happy to all be together.

We woke to a beautiful, if cool, day on Sunday. There were still strong winds in the morning, but it was a clear blue sky. Looking out on our street, I didn't see much damage aside from our neighbor's mailbox that had blown over. It wasn't until I tried to go grocery shopping around 1pm that it dawned on me that there really was storm damage. I drove by our old neighborhood and saw that everyone's 6' wooden privacy fences had blown down. I tried to go to Walmart but it was without power and closed until further notice. When I spoke to a lady at the grocery store working in the produce section, she said that there were power lines down with live wires all over her neighborhood but "luckily" some guy had a horrific accident in his truck and when the police and fire fighters came to help him, they moved the lines out of the way so she could get to work. (Perhaps this should've been my first clue of the type of story telling to come.) 

So Sunday we picked up our yard, and on Monday we picked up my parents' yard and then headed to the park. I returned to work today, and for us, it is pretty much business as usual here on the coast. But we are all thinking about the people further inland who were not so lucky.

Beach Bums

The kids are finishing up their second week of fall break. As luck would have it (or as the calendar worked out) I was able to take off all of last week to spend with everyone. As much as I wanted to spend time with my family, I think I wanted even more to catch up. I was so tired of feeling overwhelmed. So my plans for the week were to hang out with the kids and Jeff, to play outside every day, to spend two days away on a mini-vacay, to do lots of shopping and cooking and eat wonderful meals and fully stock the freezer with premade meals, to really clean the house, and to spend two half days working so I wouldn't feel like I was drowning when I went back to work. And I have to admit, I honestly believed that could all happen. (I have a long history of seriously overestimating the amount of things I can cram into a small window of time. But in my defense, I am really good at cramming lots of things into small windows of time.)

It wasn't long, though, before I realized my plans were doomed. It wasn't going to happen. And on a certain level I was pretty frustrated and upset. I couldn't figure out how I could possibly survive the rest of the fall without cramming all of that into a week. But I didn't want to stop playing outside with my kids. Or taking naps. (Yes. Naps. Glorious naps!) Or cooking normal amounts of food.

And it turns out as much as I thought I needed to do stuff, what I really needed was to rest. This week I've been a whole new person because I did spend time playing with the kids and reading books and watching movies. And it turns out it's great that I didn't stock the freezer because it's looking a bit iffy on whether we'll keep power all weekend. And we got to go to Wrightsville Beach twice, and spend a day in Myrtle Beach, and another day in Sunset Beach. Not only were the beach days nice (how many people get four beach days at three different beaches on a staycation?), but who knows when we'll be able to go back to the beaches because a significant amount of beach erosion is predicted this weekend. As for getting the house clean, it looks like I will have all day Saturday indoors to get it done, so that will take care of itself as well. So the lesson learned is...procrastination pays! Or something like that.

But on to the pictures.

We had gorgeous weather for Wrightsville Beach, part 1.

Then it was on to Myrtle Beach, where we spent most of our time exploring the boardwalk.

 

We actually went to Myrtle Beach because oldest girl child wanted to ride the Skywheel, and it turned out to be closed. Doh.

Since John Candy wasn't around to break us into Wally World the Skywheel, we settled on spending an afternoon in an arcade. We all went crazy with the quarters and had a ton of fun. And brought home a ton of stuffed animals.

We did actually spend a little time at the beach at Myrtle Beach.

And then it was on to Sunset Beach. The kids didn't even want to go to the beach - we had to drag them out to the sand. But then they remembered the awesome part about Sunset Beach is we can go out past the breakers and go swimming, and then, of course, they wouldn't come in from the water. But the real highlight of Sunset Beach, as always, was playing the Game of Life.

Our week ended with a second trip to Wrightsville Beach. There was a storm passing offshore and we found relatively big waves. Natalia liked watching all the surfers. I had to work pretty hard to keep Leon from swimming out and joining them.

All told, it was a great week, even if it's not what I had planned. And I'm so glad I went with the change in plans.

Kings Island

My kids just finished their sixth week of school and have already received interim report cards. But, given that everyone else is going back to school now, it seems like a good time for a How I Spent My Summer Vacation post. (Okay, and honestly, with four kids now in school, it's taken me this long to get organized enough to write a post.)

This summer we headed to Ohio to see family. Our vacation included time in both northern and southern parts of the state. While in Cincinnati, we spent a day at King's Island, a great amusement part with a fantastic kids' area. While we were there, Mike said, "Mom, you have to write about this!" So this post is for Mike.

Aside from a couple of relatively short days spent in the Magic Kingdom when we went to my cousin's wedding in Orlando five years ago, my kids have never been to an amusement park. And although that was Disney, they were so little that Ree is the only one who remembers it. So this was a whole new adventure.

Our kids work better with preparation, so before we went, we showed the kids the website (more than once, of course, at their request, as they tried to memorize all of the rides and map out the best course for the day). And we mentioned waiting in lines, especially to Nati, who has no patience. Then we crossed our fingers, coated ourselves in sunscreen, grabbed three grandparents to help, and off we went.

We went on a Thursday when the park was pretty empty and the temperatures stayed around 80 degrees. We couldn't have asked for better conditions. We arrived right as it opened. We were able to walk right in, and we soon took the obligatory pic in front of the Eiffel Tower.

We headed toward Planet Snoopy, the kids' area, which has won numerous awards. We had no real basis for comparison, but to us, it was fantastic. I figured we'd spend the morning there and then check out the rest of the park in the afternoon, but there ended up being so much to do that except for a lunch break, we ended up staying there until we left at 7pm.

I have relatively few pics of the rides, mostly because I am a big kid and I gleefully road all of them with the kids. We were also grateful to have grandparents along to help since many of the rides required an adult to sit with each child and it would've been really difficult if Jeff and I had to take one kid at a time on the ride while the other stayed with the other three kids. 

Waiting in line, brothers gotta hug.

 

Shhh! I think the girls might secretly like each other. 

 

Natalia found and hugged every character she could find. This was a country Charlie Brown. 

 

Mike and Gran riding in the front seat of the roller coaster followed closely by Grandpa Jim and Ree.

The rides were great, but I have to admit I was completely gleeful to discover there was a petting zoo. It was a fun and relaxing break to just hang out with the animals for a little while. 

 

And Natalia did not like waiting in line. But she didn't torture us too much. I would call that a successful day!

Beach Escape

I'm guilty of  being overly optimistic. It makes me a bit of an odd duck in the very serious, analytical world of auditing (as though I wasn't an odd duck there in any other way). But I do believe that there is usually good in everything, and I definitely experienced that on Sunday morning.

For the past few months, I've had a lot of trouble sleeping. I've blamed the lack of sleep on the kids and the dogs, and while they certainly don't help, I know I am to blame. (I am starting to figure out why I'm not sleeping, and that's a whole other topic.) I fall asleep without any problem, but I wake up for the day really early. Sometimes as early as 4:30.

On Sunday morning I woke up at 5:40 to a completely quiet house. No kids tiptoeing around and slamming toilet lids, no doggies pacing to go outside. It was nice. But I was also wide awake and stir crazy. The never ending to do list in my brain was screaming at me to stop wasting time. But what could I possibly do without waking everyone up? Then it occurred to me - I could sneak out for a walk. On the beach. 

I managed to get dressed and out of the house without anyone chasing madly after me. While I was driving to the beach it occurred to me that it was still not light out. I could actually watch a sunrise on the beach. It's a bucket list item that I've wanted to do for years, but I could never make myself plan to get up before 6am on the weekend for fun. That's just wrong. 

I was greeted by a beautiful, quiet beach.

 

I found a place to stash my flip flops and my water bottle, and I took off walking. I walked barefoot on the water's edge, and it was soothing. I was also lost in my thoughts. Thankfully, at one point I realized two girls were sitting on a blanket with their phones up recording something, and if not for them, I would've completely missed the sunrise.  

 

This little guy did not want to miss sunrise either. 

 

I was amazed at how quickly the sun came up, and I'm so glad I got to see it. 

 

And, yes, this experience probably just reinforced my optimism. But is that really all bad?

Finish Line

When most people think of the beach, they probably think of summer. But living in Wilmington, I really don't associate the beach with any particular season. We make an effort to go there year round. As evidenced by this ancient picture of Ree hanging out by the water in her winter jacket.

But the pool, the pool means summer. And we finally went to the pool for the first time this year on Sunday. It was crowded, but it was so great to swim in a pool. (And not just because it was 96 degrees out, although that definitely made swimming extra appealing.) And after being in a pool, it was really hard to try to shift back into school mode in the evening. Thankfully, the last day of school is this Friday.

With the end of school, we are also reaching the end of end-of-the-year events. It has been a busy year for them. We've had:

The Girl Scout Brownies bridge to Juniors.

A school spelling bee.

A preschool graduation.

A performance of Sleeping Beauty.

A first grade picnic and awards ceremony.

And a little gymnast earn her first trophy.

We just have to make it through tomorrow's Entrepreneur Fair and Thursday's third grade class swim party. And then we will be ready for summer. And real pool time.

Time Out

Sometimes I wish I could get sent to time out. Wouldn't that be the greatest? Time all alone in a room where no one could talk to me and I wouldn't be allowed to talk?  Not being allowed to leave until I felt ready to rejoin the group? Unfortunately, I don't think I'll get the privilege of a time out any time soon. But I do like taking time out from the rest of life when I can. 

Since we moved to Wilmington, my favorite place for a time out is the beach. (It's also my favorite place to relax, to go on date nights, to walk, to visit with friends...) We typically head to the beach on Sunday mornings, and it's such a nice break from the rest of the week.

We hadn't been since Mother's Day (yes, I know how spoiled I am), and it felt so good to finally get my beach time out last Sunday. Ree was still recovering from many late nights of rehearsals and Saturday night's performance of Sleeping Beauty (which was fantastic, not that I'm biased or anything), so she stayed home with Jeff. The three stooges and I met up with friends. And, of course, given that it was a typical lazy Sunday at the beach in Wilmington, we also ran into other friends. It was a very fun time. And a perfect time out. 

Nati thought the donut holes were pretty perfect too!

Memorial Day Weekend

Sometimes life is such a blur that I don't even notice how busy it is. The last week was like that. It didn't register with me that we were busy at the time, but looking back, I guess things were kinda nuts.

It started with Ree's Girl Scout bridging ceremony last Tuesday. The girls are no longer Brownies. They are now Juniors!

 

On Thursday the boys finished karate for the year. I was not invited to witness this momentous event, but apparently they were allowed to put on protective gear and beat each other with foam bats for a good portion of the class. They, of course, declared it best karate lesson ever!

Friday morning Jeff and I got to witness Natalia's preschool graduation. I suppose I could've been sad, and I admittedly got misty eyed when one of the teachers started crying (I'm a weeper!) but I was too excited. Do you know what this means? After seven years, we are done paying for preschool! And before anyone needs orthodontia!

Natalia (and some of the other girls) were not too sure about this graduation thing.

 But Nati did manage to get her diploma.

 

And she was happy when they got to dance.

The weekend forecast was abysmal with at least an 80% chance of rain every day, so we sent the kids outside every time we could. Friday afternoon they were tired, and Ree had dance at 5:00, but we still managed to squeeze in an hour of outside time after school. Ree also had a dance rehearsal from 10:00 - 3:00 on Saturday, so Saturday morning we were back outside at 8:30. (I figured someone else was already mowing. Sending my herd outside at that hour wasn't that much worse than a lawn mower. Really!)

Saturday morning we also managed to squeeze in some emergency blueberry picking. We picked about four pounds, and they are almost all gone. Without any used in baking. Someday we will actually pick enough to have some left to make a pie or at least some blueberry pancakes.

 

As it turns out, the weather was never really bad over the weekend. It rained every day, but mostly at night, and in between it was bright sunshine. So we had lots of outside time all weekend.

We had planned so stay home as much as possible, because traffic in Wilmington is horrendous on Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, and Labor Day. Except it wasn't. It was a ghost town. Except for Costco. We are relative Costco newbies and made a complete rookie mistake and went there on a holiday weekend. Holy cow. I should've realized that everyone and their brother is going there because with guests in town they can actually use that 24 pack of pre-made burgers and the 36 pack of super hextuple rolls of toilet paper.

Don't my redneck children look thrilled to be shopping? (And despite their faces, they had an amazing time at Costco since everyone, even with their picky preferences, got double digit samples including ice cream sundaes.)

Monday afternoon we had friends over. We discovered the best way to get eight kids to sit down quietly is to let them stuff their faces with Jello. 

 

The downside, of course, to the Jello eating (aside from the consumption of so many chemicals and dyes) is a whole lot of energy. But thankfully the weather cooperated, so it was outside to play with poppers.  

 

The weekend ended with Natalia passed out at 6:30 Monday evening next to Jeff while he watched the Reds game. Obviously the sign of a good (and busy) weekend.