I'm BACK--and in one piece

I wish I could say I had a restful and relaxing blog break but I DID NOT so I figured I might as well get back to blogging. :-)







Between the lice, then the earthquake, then having to evacuate my town because of Hurricane Irene...I'm feeling pretty jittery right now. The high octane coffee I'm drinking now isn't helping either.





We knew Irene was coming up the coast early in the week, but it still never dawned on us--ME--that it was actually on a direct course for our town and all coastal towns. We live back by the bay and our town floods anyway on a normal rainy day because we are a *barrier island so I was nervous.







*A barrier island is a long, relatively narrow island running parallel to the mainland, built up by the action of waves and currents and serving to protect the coast from erosion by surf and tidal surges.







Then the news starts predicting surges up of around 13 feet and winds around 100 miles per hour and I thought, "Our house is done."









Thursday afternoon Governor Chris Christie calls for voluntary evacuation of the shore towns and declares NJ a state of emergency. Then a few hours later it became mandatory evacuation. I can't tell you what that feels like to have to gather your belongings and not know when you'll be able to come back or if you'll have something to come back to, but know it's not a good feeling.







We were working like crazy to get in all my potted plants, outside furniture and grill inside. Then while I was packing clothes and food and water, my hubby worked to get everything off the floor of the garage thinking we would get some water in there (which we did).





We planned to stay with a friend a few towns over then we got an email from another friend who said he had plenty of room. He has a finished basement and a private bathroom there. We ultimately decided to go there since the kiddo would also have some playmates. We couldn't have asked for a better setup but were so grateful to all our friends and family who offered us places to stay. We are very blessed!



I think the worse part was that we knew so many days in advance. The waiting was the killer. And the news was extremely scary to watch and added to my anxiety every time it was on.



Saturday before the Irene was to make landfall in NJ, I prayed very heavily--particularly over PSALM 91 .



Then I cooked very heavily. I figured I might as well because it took my mind off things. I made a banana chocolate chip cake, enough chicken Parmesan and eggplant Parmesan to feed a small army.

Then after that, I drank very heavily. Red wine with dinner. A lot of it. But I wanted to make sure I slept through the night (which I did) I even slept through the tornado warning too!



It was all for the best. :)



Then I woke up (with a hangover) but to good news. That we had dodged a huge bullet and our town suffered minimal damage. PRAISE GOD!



All week I kept praying for God to put down his hand and shield our house and town from this hurricane and I really feel my prayer was answered. That night before Irene was supposed to hit and I was reading my Psalm 91, tears came to my eyes and I really God was going to protect us. Yes, I was still nervous because I didn't know how or what was going to happen, but looking back now, I can see what He had done for us and feel remarkably blessed that he had shielded us.



We still have to get our yard back in order and dry out our garage, but aside from that everything is good. :-)



So that's my long winded story. Whew.



It's good to be back here and on the blogosphere again. Normalcy is good. :-)



**I also want to do a HUGE shoutout to all the police and fireman who stayed during the storm and worked so great for such a smooth evacuation process. You are the best!



Did anyone else go through Hurricane Irene? Did you ever have to evacuate your town because of a natural disaster?