If you are afraid of Catepillers, DO NOT read this post!

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About a month ago we got invaded by catepillars. They were EVERYWHERE! and I mean everywhere. You could hardly walk up the driveway without stepping on one. It was insane! Alfred Hitchcock should have made a movie about them. Thank goodness my kids were not afraid of them, actually they loved playing with them. I think it kept them busy 3 days straight. Kyle gathered all the caterpillars up and put them in this plastic box so we would quit stepping on them and driving over them . Too bad he left them in there overnight and they were all dried up the next morning. Yuck!

Storm #3 The Mother of all storms!

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Well, 2 nights ago we got hit again by another storm. We weren't so lucky this time as we lost Darrens car. You can probably tell by the pictures it was pretty much demolished. We had a total of 4 BIG trees down, and 5 medium ones and a couple of small ones, so a total of 11 trees down around the house. We were so lucky though to not have the house or any of us hit. It was pretty scary- although it wasn't as long lasting as the other storms. It hit so fast and so hard, we didn't really know it was coming or what had happened till it was over.
It was Sunday evening about 8:00. Darren and I were down the street at David and Marilyns. We had driven seperately. Darren had driven his motorcycle and I drove my van. His car was left at our house parked on a grassy grave. It was on the grass because we had Pauls Birthday Party the night before and had a ton of cars in our driveway. It was the 1st and last time he ever parked there. As we were finishing up at David and Marilyns, some very dark clouds started to approach. It started raining a little, and Darren said he had better leave and get home. The rain let up a little so he went home. I gathered up the kids- but couldn't find Kyle. It started Raining VERY hard, and thundering and lightning and the wind was howling. Just like the other times. I thought maybe Kyle had already gotten in the car and wanted to get home as quickly as possible. So I ran out to my car, Ellie and Paul followed right behind me. The second we got in the car it was terrifying. The rain was so hard-the only way to describe it was like being in a serious waterfall. I couldn't see out the windows at all! Then it started to hail and the lightning and thunder were booming and flashing all around. I looked out the car window and saw a huge green branches outside the car where I knew they had not been seconds earlier. A 75-100 foot tree had fallen down right by the car. The rain and hail, and thunder were so loud I didn't even hear it! I knew we had to get out of the car, as I seriously feared it might get lifted off the ground or the windows would shatter, or we would get struck by lightning. I told the kids to run inside as quickly as possible. We ran about 15 feet uncovered and we were drenched! It was hailing too so it hurt a little. I wasn't to worried about Kyle, I figured he was still inside the house. We made it inside- but it was pretty darn scary. The power was out and I could see the huge tree that had fallen in their front yard. Then I noticed Kyle wasn't inside- I started yelling for him, feeling a little panicked when Ellie told me he had gone with Darren. She had been trying to tell me the whole time, I just wasn't listening cause I was, well, preoccupied. As we stood inside David and Marilyn's house Darren called on the cell phone and said a huge tree had fallen on his car and trees were down all over at our house. Thank goodness he and Kyle made it home within seconds of it hitting and stayed down in the basement. He didn't hear a single tree fall either because the rain was just thunderous! I think it was all over by the time we even knew what had hit us!
That night we prayed and thanked Heavenly Father that we were all safe- cause you better believe we were thankful!

Our power has been off and on constantly since then. Every time it comes on I run and stick a load in the washer, and start vacuuming! Our neighbors had their power lies ripped right out of their house and just got power today- 2 days later. Which is actually really fast considering all the damage around. I will post some more pictures tomorrow.

Tonight we had more thunderstorm and tornado warnings- but it missed us by about 15 miles.

The crazy thing is, that this storm was nothing compared to all the other storms across Texas and Missouri! We didn't make the news or anything. We live in such a crazy world. Now those tornado's in Missouri aren't even front page news, because of the one tonight in Kansas. Not to mention all the flooding in Missippi, wars in Lybia, Volcanos in Iceland and rember the Tsunami in Japan and Nuke meltdowns that just happened like last month? A year ago any one of these disasters would have stayed front page news for days or weeks! But they all get pushed back and forgotten cause something else is happening.
Just the day before this big storm, Darren said, "wow, there hasn't been a natural disaster for like 3 days. I wonder why it's been so long!"

Storms # 1&2

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We have had some MAJOR storms here the last couple of weeks. The first one we were getting warnings all day long. The news said a tornado was heading our way. It hit at night, there was a bunch of thunder and lighting, wind, power outages, but no major damage in our neighborhood. It was pretty intense.
The 2nd one was really scary. It came without warning and was pretty insane. This was last week- at night. Darren, the kids and I were in the kitchen visiting, when it started lightning outside. Then, all of a sudden it started to POUR rain outside. The wind begin to howl at the same time. We went out on our back porch to see what was going on. The lightning was unbelievable- just like in a movie, the trees were swaying so much it felt like our house was spinning. Our power flickered out. All of a sudden we heard cracking noises on the side of the house- like a tree was going to fall on our house. It was dark, so we couldn't really see. Darren yelled at us to get inside. He ran to the upstairs bedroom and grabbed Paul(who was asleep) out of bed. He was in a bedroom that was close to the tree falling sound. After a few minutes we went back on the porch to see if we could tell what had fallen, and then more tree cracking, splitting, falling sounds. This time it was from the back of the house. We ran inside once again. The kids went in the kitchen and said a prayer that no trees would fall on our house. We all went up to my bedroom and I let all the kids climb in my bed. I stood in the window and watched the rain, lighting. I listened to the wind howl and the thunder boom. I don't think more than 3 seconds would pass between lightning strikes. The sky was constantly being lit up. It is hard to describe, as I have never seen or been in such a terrible storm. I was scared, and yet fascinated by the power of nature. I went out on the front porch and watched as the storm seemed to move away. Then I went up and put all the kids in there own beds. I laid in bed and fell asleep- only to sit straight up in bed as a HUGE crack sounded right outside my window. I jumped straight out of bed and stood by the window as a bolt of lightning flashed in our back yard. I took a step back from the window- for the first time in my life I was scared of getting hit by lightning. Lightning flashed again and again as the thunder boomed. I didn't sleep much that night. The next morning I got up to survey the damage. It was a beautiful day. We had some major tree limbs down, which is the cracking we had heard on the back porch. David and Marilyn's tree house fell, and there were big tree's down all over. It was pretty intense. I felt very lucky and blessed to not have any trees fall on our house.

Easter

Michael and Kyle chilling at D&M's

Aaron and David

Our good friends Raz and Ellen Diep

Our good friends Katie and Aaron Marler with their cute baby Annabelle

From left to right we have on the front row: Koby Marler, Kyle Ernst, Ellie, Debbie's boy (not sure of his name)
Back row: Parker DeBry, Paul Ernst, Kash Marler, Peter DeBry, Debbie's girl, Emmie Diep

Cute little Ellie

Raz, Ellen, Debbie (Marilyn's sister) Katie, Aaron, David, Parker, Marilyn, William and Peter

Peter and Kyle are best friends. These 2 can change from best friends to worst enemies multiple times a day. Thank goodness most of the time they are best friends.

Easter Morning at our house. The Easter Bunny brought fun baskets!

So even though Easter was last month, I wanted to post some pictures and blog a little about it. I print my blog at the end of the year so I don't want to miss anything. Here are some pictures at David and Marilyn's on Saturday having an Easter egg hunt. We also had the Easter bunny bring easter baskets Sunday morning.

Swimsuit Shopping

Well, summer is coming and along with summer comes swimming along with swimming comes swimsuits. I couldn't put it off any longer-so, yesterday I went swimsuit shopping. This is not a fun activity for me, and probably not for most women. Not only are most swimsuits incredibly immodest, but they are so expensive for a tiny amount of fabric! And each year I always wait to buy one, because like I said earlier, it's not a fun activity for me. So by the time I really NEED a swimsuit they are completely picked over and on the clearance rack, with only animal print ones left.
I decided this year I would get a swimsuit on time for summer. I went to Target and actually found a swimsuit that I thought was cute, and pretty modest. Anyways, I tried it on and asked Kyle what he thought. He said, "mom, that swimsuit on you is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen!" LOL! Wow, kid, you are just perfect! What more could a mom ask for?!!! I bought the swimsuit.

Tornados

Well, I haven't posted on my blog for a while, because we had a huge storm here last week. Yea, it blew the power out and fried my computer. You have probably heard about all the tornado's in Alabama and the storm came right up through Kingsport. It passed right over us and it was insane. I have never in my life been scared of any weather I have been in.... till last week. I will post some video I took later. Stay Tuned.

Beautiful Marilyn

Well, in case you can't tell from the pictures Marilyn is going to have a baby. In fact, she is going to have it in 7 days! We had a baby shower for her last week. We had it outside and the weather was beautiful. The food was yummy- it was lots of fun. We are so excited and happy for Marilyn and her family!