Hopping to It: April 2011

Storms...Can't Sleep

This is the first night since the storms I can't sleep. Since our only form of outside communications has been the radio I had not seen pictures till today. Finally I saw a few through the iPhone earlier, but tonight Pastor Bernie came by for ribs and brought the newspaper...oh the pictures. I thought our neighborhood seemed bad, we knew it wasn't but when every house has some damage it seemed bad. But houses where gone. Someone said if that tornado...that I saw...had been 10-20ft lower our neighborhood would not be only clearing trees, shingles, shutters, toys and branches, but...we would be picking through rubble. This bothers me right now. How close my family was to danger. These things you don't think of till it smacks you in face. My nine year old is terrified of Tornados. We have many warnings here and many times they end up in the little bathroom. I have a plan that when we get close I will say..." each go get a pillow and blanket and grab some books and take it to the bathroom. The first wave of panic...I will say " we are fine now, it is mommy and daddy's job to be prepared and keep you safe. Then the questions..."what will happen if it knocks our house down?"...then we rebuild...as long as you guys are safe that's all I worry about.
When the warnings are close I simple tell the kids time to go read books. Off they go...my 16 sits in the living room. He knows when I say go...go...! I have my lap top in bathroom and I listen to tv and watch out the window...
I did that twice on Wed...the first time the noise and wind were loud...but minor damage.

The second time I saw the twisting off to my left when I finally realized what I was seeing.

I ran to the little bathroom and waited to the noise to go away...it did...I yelled out to Dan in laundry room "was that it?". Dan said no there is still a few more minutes....I waited.
I looked out front and thought oh good the houses are standing...

At that moment it never crossed my mind that anything could be wrong with out house. I just saw houses standing. Dan called from the back sunroom. Our nice big tree 6 feet from the house was uprooted...

Glad it went the other way, we went out to check on the rest of the house while an other storm was brewing not far from us.
House in tack, cars still there, trailer still there...

That red little car was by the truck before the storm.

Two shutters off, some roof damage...minor...our house was still standing.

The sirens still ring in my head...and I know the next time we hear them..my kids will be more freaked out...
But we will praise God with what ever we have cause all this stuff well ..........it's stuff!! My family...they are they true blessing!

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Couponing -Not Extreme!

Well my sisters started it first. This really saving money off coupons and sales! I have used coupons, but not spending time matching things up! Now I found it is worth spending a little extra time. So I have had two web sites that I follow now...
http://www.couponmom.com/ & http://www.southernsavers.com/
Today I did Publix. I tried this Saturday, but realized that I had the sale that started Monday after Easter. So my big savings today....
Cat food. It was $6.69..half off $3.35...I had a $2 off Taerget coupon, so I paid $1.35 for the bag.
Juicey juice...$2.99 half off...1.49. I had a $2 off 4 of them, 50 each off. So I paid $1 each.
Cereal....6 boxes of Kelloges for about $1.30 each nomrally $4
Most of my savings came in the buy one get one free.

I did have two oops that messed me up... those would be my boys I took. Tyson was on sale buy one get one free. A bag should have been about $3 so I told boys they could pick one. Jeremy picked a bag not on sale BOGO and only .50 off. It cost me 8.49.
Spagetti sauce was BOGO and I told Robby to get 4 jars...one he picked up was organic, cost 3.29. (the others on sale for $1.10
So lesson learned....go shopping ALONE!!!!

Now if I only got what coupons I had I would have spent less, but I had a few things to get that were not on sale. But this wasn't bad. Krogers later this week!