We're home!

The past few days have been kind of a blur....here's a synopsis of what has happened. We found out on Monday afternoon that the power in our neighborhood had been restored. This was wonderful news.....by this time, less than 30% of CenterPoint's customers had been restored, so we were among the earliest! And by Monday, Clear Lake's hospital was open, but my doctor's office still was not. So we decided to wait until Tuesday to leave.

We had so much fun on Monday.....it was nice and cool outside, so after Grant's nap we went over to Research Park (on A&M's campus). Grant ran around, looked at the ducks, and had a good time!

Then we went to eat dinner at Harvey Washbanger's (Dean's favorite place to get hamburgers in B/CS). We ate outside and Grant's dinner consisted of about half of Dean's french fries! Of course I couldn't get him to eat even one bite of my chicken, but he loves french fries! I'm glad we're raising such a healthy eater. :)

On Tuesday morning we headed back to Houston. As we drove into the northwest part of town, things didn't look too much different than normal......a few awnings and signs were down, but I didn't notice much more than that (at least on the highway). But the farther south we got (especially once we got on I-45), it started to look really dumpy. Most of the billboards were pulled off their structures, and there were bent telephone poles and store signs everywhere. It was a little bit shocking once we got off the interstate to head to our house......most of the stoplights were mangled and hanging awkwardly. The boulevard that goes towards our house has tons of trees, and many of them were laying on the ground. Our neighborhood was full of people cleaning up the messes in their backyards.....mostly just a lot of tree limbs and fallen fences.

It was just a little bit eerie walking in to our house......there was definitely a smell (a mixture of spoiled foods and kitty litter that hadn't been cleaned in five days!). And our backyard looked so much different to me. There were shingles laying all over the yard (even though we only lost them in a couple of places), and Grant's playground was a little mangled. Part of our fence separating our front and back yards was completely on the ground, and the trees were missing so many of their leaves. It felt like we had left our house in the middle of the summer, then came back in January! Our crepe myrtles and hibiscus plants were beautiful and blooming when we left, and they looked so bare.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, but I largely expected that everything would pretty much look like normal. We spent most of Tuesday just cleaning up (and thankfully our neighbor Brynna came over to play with Grant, which was a WONDERFUL help!). Yesterday we cleaned up the front yard, and we went out to get some cat supplies. We also went shopping at the Randall's down the street, which was operating on generators. The store was SO dark inside.....certain aisles were lit up, but others looked almost pitch black.....we should have brought a flashlight! And they were still in the process of removing food from the freezers.....I can't imagine how many millions of dollars worth of food has been thrown away across this area by all of the grocery stores that lost power!

Today Dean went back to work.....and my doctor's office is finally open! By the time I finally got through, my doctor was booked for today. But I'll go in tomorrow afternoon for a checkup. I feel Drew moving around quite a bit, so I haven't been worried about him. Dean's parents are on their way here as I write this.....they should be here in a few hours. And this morning, Grant and I went to Target, which has power and is already on their way towards restocking perishable foods. Dean's parents are bringing some meat and other things with them, so that should get us through until the stores are restocked! And I also noticed when we were out that the city is making a lot of progress in clearing away debris and cutting up the trees that have fallen. I can't imagine what this area looked like just after the storm passed......and it makes me wonder what Galveston looks like. Yikes!!

Some pictures we took for insurance......here's one of the sections where the shingles came off:The downspout from our gutter was bent around our house (and now has completely come unattached).

Grant's swingset/playground:The fence separating the front and back yards (Dean has already propped this up). Many fences in our neighborhood were completely down, so I guess this isn't so bad!
This little pool was between the shed and the house. The wind blew it out and whipped it around so it rested here! Kind of interesting to me.....