Wednesday, January 30, 2008

The joys of small town living

Huge wind storm last nite. Mix rain and below freezing temps and what do you get? A whole lotta yuck.

Pair that with staying in a rental property and all your stuff is packed in boxes that are scattered about everywhere.....a mess. So, when the power goes out last nite who gets to be stuck in the darkness with 3 kids? MWAH. And hubby, too.

I have one candle that is readily accessible. Oh, and some birthday candles in the cabinet. Which actually turns out to be a good thing since we have only a little teeny, tiny lighter that is pretty much on E. We light the one candle and then proceed to carry it around the entire house looking for the big, brown box marked candles. Eventually find the box and now we have more candles to light. That is where the bday candles some in handy. Light them and then pass the torch.

During all this we do have one flashlight that is a rechargeable gem. We do take turns using this while we are scurrying around looking for things. We do not, however, want to use it often for fear that it will use all its juice and then what. Of course, we have no idea how long this outage will go on.

I did manage to scrounge up many useful things in my hunt. Several candles, matches, some gum. Never know when I might need that over the course of the evening. I gotta keep these kids quiet somehow, right? Never did find the battery powered radio. One of the main things on my search list. It would have been nice to know what was going on out there, how long to expect it, was there school in the morning? Those kinds of things.

Needless to say, this began about 6pm or so. By 8 the house was getting a little cold. Its time to get the little guy down to bed. I am fearing a huge blow up on his part. He will not get to listen to music, he will not get to have his fan on, he will not get to have his space heater making his room all warm and cozy. Mind you, I have kept him up a little later on purpose. Hoping that he will be so sleepy that he wont notice all the things that arent right. I pull out his long footed jammies, a long sleeve onesie, some socks and his diaper. He is all nice and cozy. I grab him another blanket, get his teeth brushed, read Itsy Bitsy Spider by candlelight and then lay him down. The whole time I have my fingers crossed. Night, night, the whole deal.....He falls fast asleep and we never hear from him again till morning. I still think I sealed the deal when I let him carry the battery powered lantern up the stairs. He even asked for it this morning.

The power came on, I think it was like 11 pm last nite. Not so awful.

So, today...on the honey do list.....emergency kit supplies....another storm brewing tomorrow..I dont want to have to do this all again without the things we need. What do you have in your emergency kit? I am for sure thinking I need some chocolate in there. Im just saying.

5 comments:

Meg said...

ooh, that stinks! I'm glad it didn't last too long, and that the kids handled it well. That's always a bonus, huh?

I love power outages in the summer (as long as we've got water) but hate 'em in the winter. It's too cold and dark for them to be any fun, then! One emergency item we have that I think is awesome is a portable weather band radio. It takes batteries, or you can use the little crank on the side to get it going. It gets the National Weather Service channels, plus regular AM and FM radio, and it's got a flashlight and even a siren built in. Plus, it came with a cell phone adapter, so you can charge up you battery with it. I forget how much it was ... $40 at a camping store, maybe? I love the thing.

Anonymous said...

Don't ever say "I" didn't warn you, all this stuff was going to happen in that little town, and you better have all that stuff ready..I guess maybe you should listen to your ma!

Leighann of Multi-Minding Mom said...

We have a back up generator but have only had to use it once (last month when there was a power outage for a few hours). It powers our furnace and fridge, lights in the bathroom, stove (in case we need to boil water) and the TV. It's expensive to run because it uses natural gas. The main thing is that it runs our sump pump. We installed it right after a torrential downpour left our basement under 2 feet of water and our sump pump failed! We always have a full house (basement) when there is a tornado warning!

But ask me where to find a candle or matches? I have no idea!

frugalmom said...

Meg: We have since gone out and replenished our storm kit. We got a crank light and a battery powered radio. Also a clicker lighter thingie for the candles, and a big package of batteries. When we get into the new house we will be getting some more rechargeable flashlights, but right now we dont really have much space to need more than one.

ma: Yeah, yeah


Leeanthro: That sounds fancy. We will have a back up sump in the new house. It is hooked into the city water or something like that. Is that bad that I dont really know how it works?

Crazy Young Black Women said...

All I can say is told ya so. But from everything you have said, the good seems to outweight the bad. I am thinking you should go with the first suggestion, get a generator!