Hurricane Irene

Josh and I consider ourselves experienced hurricane veterans.  It's a strange thing for a couple of Utahns, but we have now experienced Hurricane Isabel while living in Virginia, Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Ivan while living in Mississippi, a couple of smaller tropical storms, and one Hurricane-like epic wind event in Washington state.  You could say these things follow us around.  So a couple of weeks ago when yet another hurricane was forecast off the east coast, we didn't think much of it.  Josh stocked up on some water and batteries and we kind of figured it wouldn't be much of anything.

The storm was scheduled to hit us on Saturday August 26th.  On Thursday, things were looking quite bad.  It had increased to a category 3 and was headed straight for the Outer Banks.  Josh was getting nervous.  He pointed to all the trees around our house and we wondered if we should evacuate.  He ended up calling around and found one of the last generators in town and we decided to stick around.  Before Katrina hit us in Meridian, we bought a generator, and were later reimbursed by FEMA.  Then, the stupid thing was stolen from us in Washington after the big windstorms up there.  So we forked over 800 bucks another generator.

Friday afternoon, the outer bands of the storm started to hit us and it started to rain.  I thought it seemed pretty early since it wasn't supposed to start until Saturday afternoon.  That night we went to bed with a complete and total downpour.  Josh described it as a fire hose pointed directly at our bedroom window all night long.  It was relentless and we both had a hard time sleeping (luckily, the girls didn't seem bothered at all).  We were both up at 5 am because it was strong enough that it was getting a little scary.  By then the winds had started to pick up.  Here's a picture of what it looked like from our back door.

 

The eye of the storm wasn't supposed to hit us until later Saturday afternoon, so we sat around and tried to entertain the girls and the dog.  Josh put on his helmet to take Blue out to go potty a few times.  During one of those trips outside, he found this beach ball that had blown into our front yard.  It had a bunch of little kids' names on it.  Sort of like the bottle in the ocean, only there was no note inside.  But the girls got a huge kick out of it and ran around playing with it and yelling "ball ball!".  

The power went out around 10 or 11 am.  We thought our radio would work, but we didn't have the right batteries, so we were relying on updates from family and the WITN (local TV channel) Facebook page (thank goodness for iPhones and social networking!) until Josh could get the generator up and running.  This proved to be quite entertaining.  I should preface this by staying the local news (and national news) had done NOTHING but cover this storm in the week prior.  I mean, it was constant.  And there were 5,000 stories about what to do to prepare.  But people were posting the craziest things on the WITN Facebook wall and were completely annoyed and angry that their power was out during a hurricane.  Here are some of the posts:

• do any 1knw wen power is cumn bck on n lagrange

• kan we please get sum info on williamston we are pitch blk!!!!

•  WHAT'S GOING ON WITH THE POWER IN WASHINGTON, NC?

• When will windsors light get fixed because this is redicilous I live at greens cross

• Any open Bojangles?!?  (seriously, is this real???  I can't decide)

• Lights still off in ayden nc come on ayden utilitys

People were asking about their power while the storm was still RAGING outside.  I felt bad for finding this entertaining, but it was crazy and we were bored!   Meanwhile, apparently the national news only covered what MIGHT happen in New York City.  This was extremely irritating because when we talked to our families, they didn't have a whole lot of information for us.

The storm had some serious staying power.  It continued on all day long on Saturday with the same relentless wind and rain.  The other hurricanes we have experienced are usually in and out in around 8 hours.  This lasted more than 24 hours.  We went to bed Saturday night with still more wind and rain.

Sunday morning we finally woke up to sunny, blue skies.  Of course, this means it was getting hot in the house.  We spent most of the morning cleaning up the yard.  We had one tree down in our yard and two others that were leaning at a 45 degree angle. Our neighbor Bill helped Josh pull those two down.  

We also got out and started to check out the neighborhood and drove around town a little bit.  Our neighborhood seemed to have been hit pretty hard - mainly because we live in an area with so many trees.

Monday morning we woke up and it had started to get really hot and miserable in the house.  We were all bored and antsy.  Josh went to work that afternoon and I put the girls in the car and drove around.  We wandered around the mall downtown for an hour or so.  Apparently, it had flooded during the storm, but it seemed fine when I was there.  The girls were hot and sweaty, and starting to get cranky.

When Josh got home from work, we went to eat dinner at Morgan's downtown.  We came home and right after we put the girls down to bed, our power came back on.  We did a dance around the house, immediately cleaned up all the extension cords and fans from the generator, and had a great night's sleep. Our cable, phones, and Internet did not come back on until Friday, so I spent the week coffee shop-hopping trying to get work done.

We were of course very lucky to get power back so soon, and lucky that we didn't have any damage to our house.  There were areas that took days longer.  And there was a lot of destruction and major flooding in some areas.  So really, we were out 800 bucks for the generator, a weekend, and three trees.  But still.  I'd rather not experience another hurricane.

A good reminder

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered; forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies; succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
give the world the best you’ve got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

-Mother Teresa

Home from Summer Camp

Blue boy came home from his summer training camp a couple of weeks ago (I'm behind on this blogging thing).  He was there for a total of eight weeks.  We went up there a few times to work with him and see how he was doing.  I was not crazy about leaving him there for so long, but the reality of our lives is that we just didn't have time he deserved to train him properly.  We were very happy to bring him home and he now knows how to walk on a leash, sit, stay, heel and come.  We have been continuing his training with at least one walk per day.

The girls were so excited to have him home.  Josie calls him "buba".  In the mornings when we go in there with their milk, he follows us and they yell "ruh ruh" over and over.  And at night before bed, we all give each other kisses and hugs and they always kneel down to give Blue boy his kisses.

He has been very patient with them.  They aren't exactly gentle.  But he seems to be moving out of the destructive puppy phase and is starting to understand how to act when they maul him.  Good boy, Blue.

Namaste

 

We have been practicing some yoga at night before bed.  Josie and Piper have some very nice looking downward dogs!

Weekend Trip to Raleigh

Last weekend, we decided to take a little getaway.  We have been wanting to check out the Marbles Kid's Museum in Raleigh for awhile and were kind of itching to get out of town and visit a few other places we don't have - all the 'amenities' of a real city.  We ended up having a great time. The Kid's Museum was a lot of fun and we got a hotel with an outdoor pool and annoyed all the people who were relaxing poolside with their cocktails.  Ha! 

Here are the girls in downtown Raleigh walking into the kid's museum.  They insisted on holding hands.  Actually, it's usually Piper who insists on holding Josie's hand.  She doesn't like to hold our hands anymore - just Josie's.  It is pretty cute, but Josie gets really frustrated if she's not up for it. 

The kid's museum was huge!  We were there for a few hours.  In this section, there was music from around the world and the kids can go pick the music they want to play.  They both really got into the dancing, but Josie broke out all her moves.  She went to town dancing.  The world would definitely be a better place if we were all comfortable enough with ourselves to break out dancing like that when feel compelled. 

 And of course, there were animals.  Piper wasn't happy about having to leave this horse. 

 

Unfortunately, we forgot our camera, so we took these pics on our phones and don't have any pictures of the rest of the weekend.  We also visited Trader Joe's, REI, the Raleigh Running Company, and the Raleigh Farmer's Market.  And we had dinner at a Lebanese restaurant downtown on Saturday night and a good breakfast Sunday morning.  Why Lebanese food, you ask?  Well because the restaurant we first decided on and picked (based on their menu online) only had one highchair and it was being used.  Which is really a pretty clear message that kids are NOT welcome.  So we walked around until we found the Lebanese place, which was great.  We all loved the food except Piper wouldn't eat anything except of Clif bar.  Oh the joys of feeding a toddler!   

We look forward to our next trip to the "big city".

Wilmington Children's Museum

Yesterday, we decided to take a little day trip down to Wilmington to go to the Children's Museum.  We haven't been able to do all that much this summer because of Josh's back, but he is getting better (yay!), and we were itching to get out of New Bern.  The children's museum is in a great old building downtown and near the water.  The girls got to do some art, play with blocks, sand, drive a boat, a car, and play with the slide.  There were a lot of things that were for bigger kids, but definitely enough for little kids to keep them busy.  After a couple hours there, we had lunch at the Mellow Mushroom, and headed home during their naptime. 

 It really is funny how much fun little things like this can be with kids.  I love seeing things through their eyes and watching the looks on their faces as they experience new things. 

Because Sharing is Caring

Perhaps you are sitting there wondering what is currently on my Kindle and my iPod (ha!).  Well, you're in luck, because I am sharing them.  Earlier this week, I downloaded the new Airborne Toxic Event album, All at Once.  I loved their last album and listened to it over and over during my first trimester of pregnancy.  When I listen to it now, I always think of walking, walking, walking around the neighborhood, before I was put on bedrest and wondering what life would be like with twins.  Their new album is every bit as good as the last one.

One of the songs:


And of course, I have been a reading machine this summer.  I think the following two books have been the best books I have read all summer - and there have been a lot.  I might even put them in my top ten best books ever.

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett was a bizarre story that takes place in the jungles of Brazil.  I just couldn't put it down.  Here's the NYTimes book review write-up.

I was so sad to finish City of Thieves by David Benioff.  This is an amazing story and made me want to learn more about what happened during Russia during World War II.  But it didn't feel like 'work' reading it.  It was just a great story.  Here's the review of this one. 

Two-zero months

 Josie and Piper are 20 months!  Last month got away from us and I didn't write a monthly update for the first time since we started this thing.  Some of the latest from the last couple of months:

• Talking: There are more new words everyday.  Josie leads the way and Piper will eventually say the same words Josie does.  Some new favorites are ewsh (shoes), pease, birbie (bird),  wa (when they want to walk), wawa (water).  Josie says more phrases than Piper, like "there you go", "all done" and "all gone". The other day, I showed her an airplane and the very next day I was changing her diaper and an airplane flew overhead.  She was so proud to say "airplane!". 
• Reading: We read a lot of books.  And by "read", I mean that they bring us a book, reverse back and plop in our lap, then we read the first two sentences and they say "all done" and go get another one.  But they really enjoy this, so we do it over and over.  We can get Piper to sit still for awhile by asking her to point out objects in the book.  It's amazing what she has picked up on.  She doesn't talk very much, but she can point out random objects like ice cream cones and bicycles.  It would make me very happy to see them love to read as much as I do. 
• Animals:  These girls love animals!  They know a lot of animal sounds, including snake, dog, cow, duck, bird, tiger, lion, frog, horse.  During our morning runs with the stroller, we try to make it over to the neighbors' house with horses in the yard.  They are captivated by them.  Then when we get home, they say "neigh!" over and over.  We also talk about all the other animals we see - the birds, the squirrels, the horses, and of course the doggies.  They were not with me when I saw a bear a few weeks ago, but that would have made Piper very happy!  Her bear has become almost as important to her as her green frog lovey. 
• Independence: Both girls would prefer to walk now than to have us hold them.  They ask to walk and then hold their little hands up for us to hold.  Cutest thing ever!  We finally ditched the wagon for walking into the Y.  It takes us awhile, but we make it inside eventually. 
• Eating: Mealtimes can really be a little unpleasant around here.  I honestly have no idea what they are going to eat from day to day.  They love something one day, and then look at it like its vomit the next day.  Piper would really like to eat rice cakes for every meal.  Half their meals end up on the ground.  Every day I find dried smoothie in different spots.  It's exhausting.  
• Buddies: These girls are turning into very different little people, but they sure love each other.  They will hold each others hands and walk around the house.  They speak the same language.  The other day, I watched an exchange where Piper pulled out her play stroller, patted the seat and grunted at Josie.  That was Josie's cue to walk over and sit in it so Piper could push her around.  They make each other giggle, and they completely torment each other.

Here's evidence:

Just for fun

Here are some pics we snapped the other day...

 Just looking cute. 

 Walking around the house holding hands. 

 Hello??  "talking" on the phone.  And fighting over it. 

Giving Kisses

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore… but let there be spaces in your togetherness. And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.
-Kahlil Gibran
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Washington Sprint Triathlon

Triathlon number two of the summer was last weekend.  The Washington Sprint Tri, which was held about 45 miles north of here in little Washington, in and along the Pamlico River.  It was a great day and a lot of fun!  A couple of months ago, I managed to convince my good friend McKenzie that she needed to join me for this.  Kenzie is a natural athlete, but it took a little convincing.  I think she had a blast and I'm pretty sure she is hooked now.  I'm so glad I had a buddy to do this one with.

It was fun having Peyton and Davis there to cheer us on.  Kenzie and I unknowingly were twinners with the same outfit. 

Remember my last triathlon??  I think it was pretty foolish bold of me to sign up for an open water swim after that freak out.  But I did a lot of swimming over the past two months and I really felt like I was ready for this.  It was a 750 meter swim and I regularly swim over a mile in the pool without stopping ...

These three pictures pretty much illustrate how I was feeling before the swim.  You can see me getting progressively more nervous.  I think I said a prayer or two that I wouldn't drown. 

Good luck hugs...

And here's Kenzie coming out of the water.  She did great!

And here I am after my swim.  I am smiling, but there wasn't anything pretty about it!  It was slow and painful.  I really would like to do a few more tris next year, but I will need to practice more open water swimming before I get out there again. 

Out of the water and in transition

Out on the bike.  Definitely my favorite part of the triathlon.  That might seem surprising given my history as a runner, but honestly the bike is just the most fun.  I rode really fast and I passed a lot of people.  This bike leg was 13 miles. 

And finally, out on the run, a 5K.  By the time we got out there, the heat index was up there in the high 90s.  The end of July in North Carolina is just going to be hot - there's no getting around it.

And finally, all done.  I'm not sure what is going on with my hat.  I guess I was tired and couldn't quite get it on all the way.

I am continuing my summer of multi-sport training next month with a duathlon on base.  No swimming and I am quite happy about that!