Isabella's First Laugh

7 Days without power can make you a little stir crazy, so Emily and I decided to get out of the house today and check out Best Buy. We found the perfect little video camera to shoot Bella quick and easy so that we can update the blog with videos for our family and friends that are not able to see Bella on a regular basis. Well as soon as we got over to Emily's parents house I got out the camera and learned how to work it. Then I turned the camera on Bella and she put on a show. We are very lucky that we got the camera today because Bella decided to laugh out loud for the first time on camera. If you are having a bad day just check out this video and it will put you in a giggle fit just like it did to us.

still no power

still blogging from my iphone.  we have no power at our house.  luckily the weather has been nice.  it is starting to warm up a little bit  but we have a generator so we are doing pretty good at keeping cool.  iI am not sure when I will go back to work.   probably next week.  we are so blessed that we did not sustain much damage considering what happened within miles of us. I will post pics when we get back up and running.  I must say that hurricane was a very scary experience.  not sure if I will ever stay again.  I guess we will just have to see.  

quick update

We are still doing fine here in Friendswood. We did just received word that we have lost power at our house in LC. I hate to think about how long we will be without it. We also were told that we have not had any rain yet at our house. Terry, Dad, and Buddy ventured over there around 5 this afternoon to see what the creek was doing. It had completely covered the road at that time. We are still not expecting for our house to flood. We still have power here at Lesli's, thank goodness! We are having some pretty high gusts of wind but we are still good here in "the wood"!

Ike

We are at Lesli's, been here since about 9:30 this morning. We have spent the majority of the day outside. It has been nice and breezy. We have had a few major gusts of wind but nothing serious up to this point. We decided we better spend as much time as possible outside since we will all be together inside for a good long period of time.

If you are watching the news you are probably seeing Galveston getting hammered. Please know that at this time we are not seeing anything like they are. We are not expected to get the storm surge that Galveston is getting. We also found out that Lesli's house is actually the highest point in Friendswood. So I think we are good when it comes to water. Wind...we should be fine there also. They have hurricane straps to hold the roof on tight.

This morning before we left we drove down to the creek about 5 blocks from our house. This creek feeds into the lake which feeds into the bay. As you can see it was already coming over the road. Our understanding is that our house is much higher than the creek. Here's hopin'!!

Picture of the first lost twig!! As you can see it's a doozy :)

Terry and Bella

As you can see we are just relaxing for now. So hopefully for now this has made some of you feel a little bit better about us sticking around.

Here is a video of the wind!

I dont like ike!!

Posting from my iPhone. We lost power at about 2:30am. I dont like Ike!!! Things have calmed down for the time being. Gusts are at about 53 mph it was about 73 mph. It is quite loud when we get those high gusts. We are only halfway through with this. The eye is now passing just to the east of us. On a positive note.....Grammy has taught herself how to knit!!

Getting Close

We are getting ready to head over to my cousin's house. The first bands are coming through but we aren't feeling any real effects yet. We are getting stuff off of the walls and finishing packing. I really have no idea what all I need to pack. I'm just throwing stuff in.

The Strand in Galveston is already flooded, not from rain but the water is already coming up that high from the coast. It looks like it will be a direct hit on Galveston which is actually a better scenario for us a little further inland. The storm surge should not be as bad so the flooding hopefully will not be as bad. We are still hoping it may go in East of Galveston. I guess time will tell. They are predicting that we could be without power for at least 2 weeks. UUUUGGGGHHH!!!! At least there is a bit of a cool front coming through right after the storm. Maybe that will make it bearable. We do have generators at Lesli's, THANK GOODNESS!!

Our family is going to be a little spread out but we will be in the same area. Tim, Alyssa, and Ryan will be several miles from us at Tim's best friend's house. Last I heard Courtney was going to Carthage with her mom. That may have changed, they may have decided to stay, but I'm not sure. We will be with my parents and grandmother at my cousin Lesli's house. All of our houses are boarded up, quite a strange feeling actually.

Cell phone service is already not great. If you want to get ahold of us the best thing to do would be to text message us, that seems to be going through better.

I'll keep posting as long as I can. I'm thinking we will probably lose power sometime tonight. Maybe, HOPEFULLY, we will be lucky and we won't!!

Pray for us!!!

IKE is EEK!! part 2

Alrighty, we are officially "hunkering"down. I love that phrase, it is so Texas!! Anyway, Terry is boarding up the house as we speak. I got home from work about 20 minutes ago. Yep that's right, work, and because I left early to prepare for the hurricane I had to use a personal day. WHATEVER!!! Our zip code is not under mandatory evacuation. Some of our neighbors are staying put right here. We will be headed over to my cousin Lesli's house where we will ride it out with my parents. Safety in numbers, right?

Apparently our neighborhood is the second highest spot in our city. Let's hope that is right because I really don't want water in my house. I am EXTREMELY nervous about all of this. Serious stomach problems this morning caused by my nervousness. I will continue to update as long as I can. For now the weather is beautiful!!! What will the next 48 hours bring?