B’s blog

We are going to goto the Cubs/Astros game tonight. Luckily since Erik is a big Cubs fan, we got tickets behind the Cubs dugout. I wasn’t in the mood to get beat up by Astro fans tonight. It’s gonna be a break from this past week, a much needed break. Also, I think on Sunday afternoon we may try to find a pumpkin patch. Even though it’s fall now, it still feels like the dead of summer here! We are suppose to get a a cool front today and through the weekend. It’s been anywhere from 100-117F with the heat index this past week, after the hurricane, so they view 80F as a cool front here. That’s just funny to me.

I finally finished another 3 day stretch at work. We are still under disaster mode as we are short staff, medications, linens, food, etc. Should straighten up by the end of the week. We still have nurses that have no electricity at their homes and won’t for up to a month due to some major damage on one of the transformers or something like that. People are on understandibly on edge. Human Resources forced my boss to fire 2 nurses who were no call/no shows over this past week and one of the night nurses resigned over this, saying he didn’t like the way the hospital handled things. So we are down now 3 full time nurses. I was asked to switch weekends permanently due to them losing those nurses which gave me this weekend, my birthday, off and also the weekend my parents are here, and Christmas most likely. Unfortunately I have to work all 3 days now that Uncle Paul is in town next week. Sorry Paul! I will make sure Erik and the kids get over to Kim’s to visit with you though.

We heard that our good friends Tonja and Doug are planning to visit us in January and can’t wait to see them!! Ya’ll don’t know how excited we get when we hear from home.

I know alot of people are trying to get ahold of us to talk about the hurricane. I’m sorry that we’ve been so busy and the phone circuits haven’t been 100% since the storm. I’m working until Thursday so won’t be able to call everyone. Please know we are grateful for your prayers and concerns and we love you all. We are getting back into the swing of things again and life is as busy as ever. Kids still aren’t back to schools until Wednesday so having 3 going to the daycare is expen$ive!! I’m trying to keep my spirits up and get back to normal as quickly as possible. We can’t wait to enjoy the nice weather soon. 117F heat index today just isn’t my idea of fun. But when it’s snowing and drifting back home, Houston weather is going to be awesome…and it’s right around the corner…hopefully. We aren’t ignoring ya’ll, just don’t know which way is up or down right now.

We left the hospital on Saturday morning. It was still sprinkling and the winds were still noticible. We came home to no damage to our home. In the subdivision some trees were down and landed on fences, the electricity was out but overall we lucked out. We suffered through the heat until Sunday morning when the radios said it was going to hit 105F heat index. So we packed up the van again and were going to head back up to Kingwood to the hospital. We drove around and saw the utility company working on lines at the front of the subdivision and I stopped and talked to one of the guys. He said it would be back on in a few minutes. So we drove around, found a gas station with gas and filled up the van, then drove back home. Still no electric so we put on the sprinkler and filled up the baby pool. At around noon we heard all the AC’s turn on at the same time and were so happy to finally have electric again!!!!! We luckily have gas appliances so I could make a hot meal and pancakes this morning for breakfast. Kids are still outside running around in their swimsuits even though the house is cooling off. All the neighborhood kids are playing so nicely together through this and we even met some more neighbors. What an experience! People are asking what it was like. We went to sleep on Friday night and about 4am I woke up and thought the roof was going to blow off the hospital. They have a drop ceiling and the wind was howling through the ceiling. Sounded really scary but the kids slept through the whole thing. I woke Erik up and we just watched out the door down the little hallway where we set up camp. We were moved a total of 3 times and were very fed up and ready to leave as soon as we could. The hospital fed everyone 3 meals a day for free. The kids made some friends and ran around like idiots, their normal. But they were obliviously to the whole thing which was good. We are so blessed that we only got what little weather we got. God is so good! Here are some photos: I wanted to get this posted as I knew people were worried.Sorry it’s so unorganized and my thoughts are all over the place. I’m exhausted, physically and mentally. We are safe and things will get back to normal in no time. Kids are off school until Wednesday from what I hear as there are trying to avoid the gridlock of traffic getting back into the city.

Our “campsite” at the hospital

The sky the day after

If you could find plywood, you would have boarded up the windows, but everywhere sold out early

trees fell on the fences

fences blew down

trees uprooted

traffic lights fell down

real quick, we are staying at the hospital, have been since thursday. it’s the safest place and i get paid 24 hrs a day just for being here whether i am needed or not. we have flown in nurses from denver, ft lauderdale, austin to help out. the hurricane is now down from a category 5 to a cat.3 which is in our favor and heading more east, into louisianna. we will get the high winds and the rain but the eye won’t pass through us. i’m hoping for a home when this is over with. we taped up the windows to avoid them from shattering, all the electronics are in inner rooms with no windows. the kids and erik are here with me…so is the dog in her own little room. we are sleeping on blowup mattresses on the floor in the mall area of the hospital. they are feeding everyone for free. we are anticipating having no electricity for up to 2 weeks. i wanted to make sure i let you all know we are safe so far. the traffic was horrific trying to get out of town. it took kim and steve 10 hrs to get just outside of dallas. all the interstates were gridlocked on thursday. we are in disaster mode at the hospital and are running out of narcotics and other drugs as people are coming to the er to get a 3 day supply due to the pharmacies being closed. no store is open. there is no gas in all of houston. there is no more bottled water. we have some in the van and here in the building. we have a few days worth of clothes and very few canned goods in the van. all my scrapbooks and documents and the computer i moved into the trunk of the other car in hopes it is more safe there. everyone is in panic mode. this is by far the scariest thing i ever have been through in all my life. prayers please as the rains have started and the winds are starting to blow.

We are advised to have 1 gallon of water per person per day. So that is 6 gallons a day x ??? days we could be without water if the storm hit us. I went to 3 stores today, including walmart and only Dollar Tree had water left. They had a limit as to how much you could buy too. So I have 24 bottles of flavored propel water and 2 cases of regular bottled water. I stocked up on batteries, flashlights, diapers, wipes, and got a battery operated clock. Erik has his cell phone so we can at least call out considering that works. I think we are as ready as we could be if things get rough. Being prepared hopefully will keep this at bay, no pun intended. If it does become a Category 4 Hurricane, we will evacuate to Iowa, regardless of our jobs. It’s nerve wracking to think of what to pack in the event we have to leave. Everything can be replaced except my family and my scrapbooks. I’m going to get important documents and papers together just in case. I don’t want to be surprised.