The Storm

Here's what happened...

Monday: Chris tried to work but that wasn't happening because of the snow that fell all day long so we decided to drive to Tacoma and get the license plates for our car and stop at Tijuana Taco in Lakewood for lunch. We knew the roads would be interesting but we're both very comfortable driving in snow/ice and would've died being stuck at the house all day. Well, let me tell you... there are some pretty STUPID drivers out there!!!! People were parking and leaving their cars in the middle of the FREEWAY!!! It was hilarious! And they were cars that you'd expect to be able to handle in the snow. We didn't even try to take I-5 and decided to take the back roads. It tested our knowledge of routes because we were trying to find a route that had the least amount of hills.

We finally made it to the dealership, got our license plates (which say ACH**** haha I have the Ach-ooo car!) and went to lunch. If you've never been to Tijuana Taco and live in the Tacoma area, PLEASE go!!! It's right by the Lakewood Towne Center and it's amazing!

Anyways, then we decided to go to the mall because The Children's Place is having all of their outerwear accessories (hats, mittens, etc) for $5. They didn't have anything that I hadn't bought on Thursday so we just walked the mall for awhile. Then we made the trek home.

It snowed all day and was really windy. The wind wasn't any stronger than in Ellensburg but the trees over here don't know how to withstand it. So there were branches and downed trees all over the place. Around 530pm we fed Carver dinner and at 6pm our power went out. At least Carver got fed, right?

So we got the bright idea to head to Subway and Target since we were twiddling our thumbs at home. As we were coming down our hill towards town, we saw a downed power line and at the same time we saw a tree in the road. Now, remember that it'd been snowing all day so there was ice on the road. Well, we couldn't slam on the brakes so we went up and over the tree. Thankfully it was a small tree and it, thankfully didn't do anything to our car.

So we putts around Target after eating dinner. On our way home we went up our road to see if the tree had been cleared (I'd called 911) and there was ANOTHER tree in the road that was windshield level. Definitely not going up that way. So we went to the next parallel road. There was a tree down there too. So we went to the next road over from that and decided to just go for it. We couldn't see anything and felt that if we did come across something we could safely back down the road and turn around. Well almost to the top, there was a tree down but it was angled just so that we could drive underneath it (it was a pretty small tree). So we did that and cut across to our road.

Once we hit our road we were in the clear as far as trees were concerned. But remember that it was icy and there are hills every which way around our house. Well, all that to say, we made it home safely. :) We made a makeshift bed in the living room in front of the fire (gotta love wood fireplaces!!!). Carver thought that was the coolest thing ever! He was running in circles around the 'bed' having a great time. He didn't end up going to bed until around 9pm.

Tuesday: When we woke up Chris walked the property line to check the fences and then ran to Albertsons to get Starbucks. Chris wanted to drive by some of our accounts to check for any damage so we loaded up in the truck this time. We met Kim for lunch and then stopped by a couple accounts. We went back to Target, because that's what we do when we get bored and then came home. The trees on our road had been cleared and the roads were A LOT better today. We were toying with the idea to leave for Ellensburg today but Chris didn't want to leave if the power wasn't back on because it was supposed to be really cold that night. Well it didn't come back on.

At some point that evening, Chris remembered that we had a portable generator we use on jobs when they have to use nail guns, etc. What a great idea! So we hooked up the fridge for awhile and then the microwave so we could have a hot meal and then we got even more adventurous and hooked up the tv! We still didn't have cable but Carver got to watch Happy Feet and after he fell asleep, Chris and I got to watch one of our netflix. Too bad we didn't think of this last night. :(

Wednesday: Still no power. At some point last night the generator was making funny noises (low gas, I think) so Chris worked on that this morning. He had to run to Home Depot for some starter fluid and got me a coffee while he was there. While he was out he ran across the Puget Sound Energy guy that was on our road making notes and he said that he hoped to have power back to the road today. Once Chris got back, we loaded up and hit the road! The pass was bare and wet the whole way and there was barely any cars on the road. :) It was so nice to get to Mom's and have power and hot water! I didn't want to get out of the shower!

So that was our adventure. We had Chris's mom go by the house this afternoon and we still didn't have power. We turned all of our space heaters on so when the power does come back on those will take the chill off, but it'll be an igloo when we get back. There's no way around that.

I have a feeling this is just the start of the storms for this winter. Everyone keeps saying that it's going to be worse than 2008 when parts of WA were without power for WEEKS but we'll see. It's definitely made a grand entrance.