Labor Day

A big tree fell last night, Mike had worked all day putting on a new metal roof on one of our buildings. He had two more rows of roof to put on and it started raining, so we had to pack up and quit for the day.

We came inside, cleaned up, ate supper and were relaxing watching TV when, BAM...then the electric went off. Big tree fell, big tree. Mike went out and looked to see were it was. Right by the driveway and all over the road. This was 9:30, I called the electric company, they came out and restored electric; it didn't take out the lines but bounced them together to short out the power.

Mike worked for several hours clearing the road way so people could get by, one of the township guys came after I called to help with some of the clean up.

So with that said, today, Labor Day I fear we will be laboring with clean up. I am still hurting enough that I probably be much help but I'll do what I can. Township is suppose to come and help with the clean up.....here it is 1:30 and no sign of them yet.

Think I'll take a nap.......
Jane

Power outage and snow

Woke up Saturday morning to a very dark house. The power was off!!! There was about 8 inches of heavy wet snow on the ground and power lines down, trees down, oh, what fun.
We have a big generator so we were OK and two space heaters in the house that run without electric. Mike just had to go to the building to power up the generator.

The first picture was taken yesterday afternoon, beautiful blue skies and some sunshine that the boys had to nap in the sun. Still cold out though but beautiful!
The one above was taken this afternoon when it started to snow again. When I snapped this one the snow looked like huge down feathers floating down out of the sky. Then it started raining! UGH! We are supposed to have freezing rain then more snow up to 8 more inches....enough already!

This was taken on Saturday, the trees were coated with ice and then snow. Click on the picture above to see the trees that are bent over and look like willow trees. I don't know how many tress came down.

The solar candles hanging on the hooks were blown sideways by the wind then froze that way. As the snow piled up. The wind was blowing from behind the house, which was strange; it usually comes down the creek.

As the day warmed up a bit the snow started sliding off the steel roof, hitting the second roof with a thud! (this was taken from our bedroom window.)

Above is my road cleaning crew of one. Mike and his tractor and blade; he hasn't been out on the tractor for awhile so he was having fun cleaning the driveway and the road in front of the house and buildings.
The power was off for 35 hours, I hope that this storm won't take down any power lines.
Oh, yes, the rug is finished but I have to steam it and bind it, then I will post the finished work.

Ice and Snow

Here are some pictures of our ice and snow when the power was off last week. The orange dot in the trees is a repair man from the electric company working on the downed lines. I would hate to have a job like that, these poor guys worked tired, wet and cold to get the power back on.
A shot looking up at the granary roof with icicles.

Looking from the sunroom at the ice hanging off the roof.

Ice and snow covered the pines but we had no damage to limbs.

If a Tree Falls in the Woods???

If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to see it does it still make a sound when it hits the ground?
Damned right it does; especially if it's at 5:40 in the morning and you are fast asleep in your warm fleece sheets! The sound was so loud and the vibration from it hitting the ground shook the house! Then there was the big orange fire ball that lite the place up as the top branches hit the power lines causing the top one to hit the bottom one; the sound of the electrical appliences in the house screeching as the electric blinked off and on several times before dieing completely! Then everything went dark, thank goodness for the full moon outside! Just the day before I looked out the front upstairs window to a tree just on the edge of the creek wondering when it was going to fall. It is in the process of dieing and has some sort of fungus growing at it's base; but that's not the tree that fell and I'm glad for that. It would probably hit the front porch and take both power lines with it on the way to the ground! The tree that fell, must have been dead because there were no small top branches (see picture)

For some strange reason the pieces of the tree didn't cover the road? It looks like it bounced and rolled to the edges. We didn't see this until the sun was coming up, couldn't really see it in the moon light. I haven't gone out yet to see what is in the creek. The pictures of it were taken from the upstairs bathroom window.

I had to get up and find a flashlight and locate the old rotary phone, remember those???, for all the fancy technology having a rotary phone coming in handy when the electric is off! I called the electric company and finally after what seemed like 20 minutes got a LIVE person. Before getting her though the automated answering machine went through a list of three options, then said press 1, 2 or 3 on your phone....NO.....I can't use my push button phone because the electric is OFF!!!! So finally after it didn't get a response it said for those using a rotary phone speak the number one, two or three. OK, this is good, so I said "one", we are sorry we couldn't understand your response! GRRRRR, so I did this 4 times before they could hear me..........glad this wasn't an emergency!!!!! So finally when the "person" gets on the phone I was able to tell her our address and that a tree had fallen but didn't know if the lines were down. She would send the repair truck out. I thought OK it's gonna be awhile; but no! Within 45 minutes the truck was coming down our road, stopped for a minute then went on down the road to the sub station. A few minutes later the electric was back on and there was a knock at the door. A service man from the power company was there on the porch, thanking me or reporting the location of the downed tree, said it saved them hours of searching for it along the lines! Yippee for the power company!! You don't realize just how important to you power is until you don't have it.

I am sure it scared the heck out of Gilly and Pokey; but when I was taking the pictures out the window they were by the back of the house sunning themselves. They came to attention when I opened the window and thought surly it must be time to eat breakfast, right??? Not yet, boys, you will survive a few more hours....go back to sleep! I will be there shortly.