HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Well, we ushered in 2009 happy and cozy - but that almost wasn't the case. Just after 9AM the wind started howling and we lost power. When we heard fire trucks we knew it had to be a doozy. Sure enough, a huge tree had fallen just 3 houses down from us. It was enormous, having taken down all of the power lines and poles near it and completely blocked the street. One of the neighbors had the bad luck to be parked the wrong place as well.


Just after the fire trucks left, another tree came down at the opposite end of the street basically blocking us in. A quick-thinking neighbor chainsawed some branches on that one to open a lane so at least we had a way out. That was especially helpful since the estimate was that power wouldn't be restored until 9AM - on Saturday. WHAT?! I grabbed the girls and headed out to find some errands to run instead of sitting in a cold dark house. On our way out we say a 3rd tree around the corner that had come down across a neighbor's front yard. With the entire back of our yard being thickly wooded, we were really lucky not to have any damage ourselves.

Luckily we have a great power company (okay, maybe it was just a group of guys wanting some serious overtime pay!) and after seeing six of these rigs working at one time on our little stretch of street, we were happy to have the lights and heat back on around 11PM.

Bummer about the car though. So much for their new year. At least no one had damage to their house and there were no injuries. This is what was left today after the tree removal company did some chopping and hauling. These are just the outer limbs that landed in the neighboring driveway!