Winter Is here Already?????

I really really really hate winter. My favorite time of the year is fall. I love the sound of rain on the roof and the leaves blowing all around. I love the smells of a newly lit fire and the aroma of pumpkin pie baking. Fall is my favorite time of the year. The only drawback with fall is that it leads into winter. Well yesterday we had our first taste of winter a bit early. They first started forecasting snow in the higher elevations. Then they brought it down to where we live, but they said we would get a dusting to an inch. And they said it wouldn’t start snowing until late evening. And would stop well before morning. You can imagine my surprise when about mid morning there was already snow mixed in with the rain. By noon time it was entirely snow. Soon we started hearing things crack and pop outside. There was a huge limb in the back of my husband’s truck. I told him I thought he should move his truck into the driveway so it would be further away from the trees that lined the street. About ten minutes after he moved his truck a very large limb came down. Only minutes earlier it would have gone right through the windshield of his truck. Now the truck was safe in the driveway away from the trees. A few minutes after that the lights blinked and then went off. It seems that the heavy wet snow falling on trees that still had most of their leaves was just too much weight for them to bear. As the limbs started falling down, so did the light wires.

We were without heat. Again. On Wednesday, a pipe coming out of the furnace developed a leak. My husband had to shut the furnace off and drain all the water out of the pipes and the radiators to keep the basement from getting flooded. He ordered the parts right away that night and paid extra money to have them delivered by Friday morning. On Thursday night he was able to remove the old pipes and get everything ready to put the new ones in place.

On Friday we were hosting a party for 50 homeschoolers. I kept apologizing to everyone about how cold it was in the house. We had one little electric heater that we kept on in the dining room. That is where most of the people hung out for the afternoon. The kids of course didn’t mind. They were running in and out the doors all afternoon. They had a great time. At one point in the afternoon they all lined up and went up and down the street Trunk or Treating to each car as the moms stood by their cars handing out treats to everyone. They had a great time with that. Finally all the families went home and I was able to start a fire in the fireplace. I was afraid to have a fire with so many little ones in the house.

When my husband came home from work Friday night he was able to put the new pipe pieces in place, fill the pipes up with water again. And we had heat. It was the first time I was warm in 3 days. Little did we know that in just 18 hours we would lose heat again.

So when the power went out on Saturday we immediately lit a fire in the fireplace so we would stay warm. We spent the evening laying around the living room relaxing. We finally went upstairs to bed. Since Dakota had no nightlight in his room he slept on the floor in our room. The water bed was quite toasty so we snuggled in for a good night’s sleep. Unfortunately by morning the waterbed was starting to lose it’s toastiness. We put an extra blanket on the bed and snuggled for a while to stay warm. When we got up there was still no electricity or heat. So we light another fire and hung out in the living room. I was able to make breakfast using the gas stove. I just had to light it with a match instead of the instant on feature.

About 2:30 this afternoon the lights came back on. We still don’t have internet. I’m hoping they get it fix tomorrow. I hate not having access to the internet. Especially when there is an emergency situation like this storm. When I finally get internet back I will post this article with a few pictures.
Carrying the downed branches out to the street so they can be picked up.

It's now Tuesday and we still don't have phone, internet, or tv. I am at a local restuarant with WiFi right now. I don't have the pictures on my computer yet. I'll have to add them later.
Pictures added on Wednesday. We now have all of our services restored.