Around 3:00 am last night, the entire house woke up because of a noisy wind storm with rain, hail, and yes, snow. It definitely reminded me of the April storm when Mother Nature decided to play a joke on our family.
Around 12:30 am on April 1st, Jason and I were settling into bed, listening to the wind howl. We had just finished praying that our house would be protected when we heard this loud crack. Jason immediately jumped up to see what had happened. I, on the other hand, snuggled in deeper, preferring to literally bury my head and ignore the problem.
Jason came back and told me that a huge limb had fallen from our locust tree. While he wanted me to come see, I chose to stay put, knowing that I would only worry, and that the problem would still be there for me to examine in the morning.
It was.
Since the tree fell on some electric lines, we called the power company immediately. The man who came out in the middle of the night took one look and said, "That's definitely more tree than I can handle! I'll send a crew out in the morning."
While we didn't lose power initially, the lines were pulled nearly to the ground and the poles were bent from all the tension. When the power company cut the lines so that tree work could begin, the cables sprang like a slingshot.
Our trampoline took quite a hit. Still, it's quite miraculous that the tree fell right between our home and the neighbor's without damaging either. Its fall was softened by crashing into a different neighbor's pine on the way down.
Still quite the mess to deal with. (Do you like Snow White with her rubber rain boots?)
We learned a thing or two through this whole experience. 1. Tree work is frightfully expensive. 2. Insurance doesn't pay well for it. Our policy would cover up to $500 per tree for tree removal, after we paid a $1000 deductible. Sigh. Needless to say, we didn't file a claim. I guess that's what emergency slush funds are for.
A view from the upstairs window during the clean-up process.
The kids thought it was great fun watching them top the tree from the cherry picker.
In the end, we decided to save a few thousand dollars by having the tree company leave a fifteen foot trunk. Who knows? It could make a marvelous totem. :)
Even after the tree company left, there was still a lot of work to be done. Fortunately I have a handy husband who was able to rebuild the fence, as well as fix the soffit where the power lines had pulled it down.
Hey Eli, you are way cuter than a fence post!
Despite the drama, our April Fools traditions continued. The kids ate cocoa puffs out of doggy bowls for breakfast.
For dinner, we enjoyed these special tacos. For those wondering, these are golden Oreo shells filled with a combination of chocolate Oreos and Nutella for the meat, green coconut for the lettuce, Starbursts for the grated cheese, and Hot Tamales for the tomatoes. While adorable, these tacos are far too much work for one person to assemble. Fortunately, the kids were great helpers.
The rest of our April Fools meal got postponed because we couldn't use our oven until the power got turned back on. Once things were up and running again the next day, we made this tasty pizza bundt cake. (That's melted provolone frosting the top.)
I feel so lucky these gals call me Mom.
So many thanks to Grandpa Charles and Grandma Susie who came down to watch Annie and Eli so that we could attend conference. In all of her awesomeness, Susie brought Conference Bingo, complete with Swedish Fish to use as markers. Be it the spirit or the sugar, the experience was definitely sweet...
....and that's no joke!
1 comment:
It was a great couple of weekends with you guys!
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