Ice on Monday, 73 on Saturday, that's NC for ya!

Saturday, March 22, 2014 - Today was a very nice day!  Weather got to 73 for the high.  Nathan had a 12 o'clock soccer game.  Great being outside and enjoying this weather.

Ball in the air after Nathan just hit it with his head.

Spotlight

Thursday, March 20, 2014 - Chad and I had the pleasure of attending a breakfast this morning to honor 6th-8th graders who were chosen by their teachers for exhibiting the character trait of the month.  Brittany was chosen by her team of teachers for the month of February - Courage.   
From school website Courage: Having the determination to do the right thing even when others don’t; having the strength to follow your conscience rather than the crowd; attempting difficult things that are worthwhile.
  Brittany's certificate in February was misdirected & did not make it into the hands of the principal.  So the three of us were able to attend twice & they recognized her with the March recipients.  Each month the principal invites someone from the community to come and speak on the character trait.  This month it was an elementary school principal.  Last month it was a high school senior.

We are very proud of Brittany for being chosen out of 900+ students.  Way to Go Brittany, keep up the great work!

Out Early

Wednesday, March 19, 2014 - Today is an early release for the kids.  They get out 2 hours early.  It was scheduled on the school calendar from the beginning.  The teachers take enrichment courses once the kids leave.  So....we have not had a normal day yet this week.

Ice, Ice, Ice

Tuesday, March 18, 2014 - No school today.  Ice on everything.  Pictures were taken around 12:30pm.  Things did not start to melt until later in the day.

St. Patrick's Day

Monday, March 17, 2014 - The kids went into school today on a 2 hour delay because of some icy roads.  Well, guess what?  The rain was turning to freezing rain and the schools decided to let the kids out 2 hours early.  Well...I was out running errands in another town, come out of the store, hear on the radio about schools in the area getting out early & find out my kid's schools are leaving early.  I am looking at the clock and doing the math and that means that my child already got out of school and was already dropped off at home and I am not there!  I am 20 minutes from home, Ugh!!!  What is going on?  The cell phone for the neighbor I had, she was not answering.  Thankfully we live in a great neighborhood and another neighbor was taking care of Nathan and another neighbor that got off with no parent.  And her child didn't make it on the bus.  After I got Nathan she had to go to the school to get her kid.....it was a crazy day let me tell you!  The buses arrived when they could, loaded kids and just took off.  Some other neighbor kids did not make it on the bus either because the bus already took off.  And how many kids went home to locks doors?

Happy St. Patrick's Day to Everyone! 

Brittany's bus was way late picking up the Middle and High because the bus driver had to take some of the elementary school kids back to the school (I guess their parent was not at the stop).

We did get a lot of freezing rain accumulated.  The kids made shamrocks and enjoyed a very short day at school!

Happy Birthday

Sunday, March 16, 2014 - Happy 65th Birthday to Dad!  Happy 80th Birthday to Uncle George!

Dad's Birthday Party

Saturday, March 15, 2014 - Mom, Dad, and Grandma came over around noon.  We surprised Dad with a birthday party for him (a day early).  He is turning the big 65!  Chad grilled us some turkey tenderloin and we enjoyed lunch.  Then we celebrated with a chocolate covered NY Cheesecake.  Yummy!  Dad opened presents and received some neat gifts.  Dad's brother, George, is also having a birthday tomorrow and he is turning 80.  Time sure does fly.

   Nathan's first soccer game of the season was today.  They tried really hard, but the other team was just better at scoring.  They had 4 subs and we had 1.  I think we got tried out.  Nathan scored the only point for our team!  Wahoo!  Go Nathan!

High Winds

Thursday, March 13, 2014 - Last night a quick-moving storm came through and toppled trees and sent power outages soaring.  The airport recorded a wind gust of 61 mph.  Duke Energy had 350 customers still without power from the Friday ice storm and by 9:30pm last night their number had gone up to 9,700 people without power.  At the bus stop this morning we learned that our neighbor 3 houses down had a huge tree fall our their house.  It hit on top of their daughter's bedroom and cracked all 4 walls and hallway.  That could have happened to any of us.  There are so many tall trees around.  So thankful no one was hurt.  The neighbor across the street could hear the crack and crunch when it happened.  The family inside the damaged house could feel the whole house shake.

Storm clean-up

Monday, March 10, 2014 -  No schools today due to 18 of the county schools without power.  It was a beautiful day, high near 70.  The kids and I headed to Mom and Dad's and helped pick up the hundreds of limbs, branches and chunks of trees that had come down because of the ice.  All the towns are waving their usual limb collection restrictions and saying, "just get the limbs to the curb in a pile and we will come collect them".  From 12:30-3pm Mom, Dad, Brittany, Nathan and I worked in 4 yards hauling branches to the curb.  3 of the 4 yards are theirs and the 4th yard we cleared out their cedar tree limbs that had fell in the neighbor's yard.  Dad had the chain saw and would cut and we would all haul.  It was such great weather to work in.  So amazing though the damage that the ice caused to some many trees.

Scene on 220

Afternoon with Youth

Sunday, March 9, 2014 - Made pancakes for our company and then they packed up and headed home.  They figured that if the power had come back on then they would have church service (Dad teaches Sunday School).  They got back home and no one was in the church parking lot and no messages on their machine about service.  Oh, well, so glad they have their power back on!  Lots of area people did get their power back on Saturday evening and Sunday throughout the day.  There were some people though that were without power for 5 days.  Tough situation.  This afternoon Brittany starts Confirmation Class at church.  After confirmation was youth (UMYF, United Methodist Youth Fellowship).  Chad and I provided the meal and were the chaperones.  The picture below is after we ate and ready for the program to start.  Nathan got to hang out with us.

Our lovely house guests

UMYF

Day Two of Power Outage

Saturday, March 8, 2014 - Mom and Dad headed back home 6:30am this morning to see about saving food in their refrigerator and check on the flooding in the cellar (water was pouring in the wall from the melting ice).  The kids and Chad headed out and had fun making small snowmen from the chunks of snow left from the snowplow that came through last night.  Once they had all the snowmen lined up they had fun destroying them.  Nathan threw snowballs at his and Brittany karate kicked hers.  I don't have a picture of this because I was videoing it.  Nathan did karate kick his big snowman down before any cars came through.
  Grandma hung out with us all day.  Later Chad took the kids on "Daddy, Daughter, Son Night" & they went and saw Mr. Peabody at the movies.  Mom and Dad arrived after dinner & relaxed after working hard all day.  Around 7pm their neighbor called to say their power had come back on.  Yeah!  Initially Duke Energy was saying power back on by Wed. at 11pm.  So glad it did not take them that long.

Louie enjoyed spending time with Great Grandma

March Blizzard

Friday, March 7, 2014 - School called 5:20am, no school today!  Back to sleep...we woke up a little after 8am, big flakes of snow were coming down!  Still snowing big flakes at 9am.  Nathan went out to explore and go sledding with our neighbor, his friend Dylan.  We only got a little bit of ice on the trees and then after a few hours it was melted.  We did get over 4 inches of snow on the ground.  After talking with my mom on the phone realized that she was not looking at a white winter scene at her house 33 miles south of here, she was looking at ice covering everything.  I was seeing on the news and on Facebook about lots of trees falling and power outages across a few counties.  Well, mom and dad lost power about 8am today.  They were running a generator and had the refrigerator and one heater on it.  Grandma had also lost power a few houses down.  During the course of the day over 400,000 people were without power.
   After lunch I started shoveling the driveway....so if Chad's plane did get in, and he made it on the roads and down through our neighborhood he would be able to pull his car in the driveway.  4:30pm my mom, dad and grandma arrived to spend the night with us...we did not loose power.  Chad had to take a different flight instead of flying through Detroit he went through Atlanta & made it home about 8pm.  I was thankful that he made it home at all today.
  So many people are without power, even our old neighborhood 14 miles from here.  So thankful my family could drive on the roads and come stay with us for heat.

Only a little more to shovel!

I am finished!