Hurricane Harvey

After Meet the Teacher was cut short due to worsening forecasts, we took a walk with Roy's mom down to Costco since it was only drizzling and we figured the more time outside before the big rains came, the better!

The next day we went out for another walk to Costco and waited and waited for these big rains to start.  The roads were totally empty ...

And the first bit of excitement was that an alligator was found on a street right near some friends' houses!

And we did our best to keep occupied while inside.

I think this was Anthony Davis, James Harden, and Steph Curry!

But after that, things started to get more serious and more scary and more devastating.  We were totally glued to the TV and internet following along with what was happing all around us and to our friends and our old neighborhood. 

May 2015 was our first flood and April 2016 was our second

You can see the waterline on the grass - this is the street that runs along the back of our apartment building.

This was an image I got online near where our old house was:

Here is the waterline at my eye level at our old neighbor's house:

And that is our old house.  You can see the waterline would have also been about eye level:

Here are our friends being rescued from their house by boat:

And the streets in our old neighborhood after people started hauling their flooded possessions to the curb:

Friends who were up near Dallas were able to load their van with supplies for all our friends who needed things here while stores were still closed or running really short on supplies:

The kids had play dates while we helped our friends at their houses:

And the kids and I made lunches to deliver to crews working on houses:

We also went to get cleaning and packing supplies when they were being handed out for free at the JCC:

I rewarded the kids with ice cream for all their hard work:

And then we delivered ice for people who still had no power and/or flooded refrigerators and replied on coolers:

And we did some laundry for friends needing it:

One day I was able to make dinner for 5 families:

And this is what we looked like when we worked on friends' houses:

I had tried to document the steps of removing dry wall:

step 1 - measure 4 feet all around the room and mark the walls
step 2 - score the 4 ft marking

step 3 - hammer below the score mark so you can get your hands inside the wall:

step 4 - pull out the drywall:

step 5 - and cut out the insulation:

And when you do it from both sides, you get to the frame.

And then this is what is left on the front lawn:

Street after street and neighborhood after neighborhood looked like this:

It was (and still is for many) a horrible time.  We had countless friends who flooded - many for the first time and many for a 2nd or 3rd time.  We feel so lucky that we were able to sell our house before this flood happened.  And I am glad we were able to help all these friends who were there for us when we flooded.  

I just hope that this doesn't happen again.

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