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The Price of Paradise

Thank you all so much for the kind words and prayers

We are used to hurricanes on the Gulf Coast

and have experienced many during the last 35 years

Most of them have caused minimal damage,

except Hurricane Ivan in 2004

which ironically hit on the very same Sept 16th date

as Hurricane Sally

During Hurricane Ivan we also lost our pier and boats

We had roof damage which eventually caused the ceilings to fall in

and we basically had to rebuild the whole house

Hurricane Ivan 2004

We raised the ceiling during rebuilding

which made a huge difference,

the house felt so much bigger

My son and I redesigned the kitchen, and he installed new cabinets and tile

By the beginning of summer 2005,

we had a new boat and pier

and were enjoying our newly rebuilt house

even though the landscape would take years to recover

This storm came upon us so fast

it was hard to prepare

Tuesday afternoon the water was already dangerously high

the pier was underwater and my family knew

that chances of the boats staying secure were slim

The boats did disappear but, his time we got a little luckier 🤞

My son, son in law, and a friend have spent the weekend

securing tarps on the roof,

cleaning up the debris and fixing whatever they could

Once they finished at our house they went to help friends and neighbors

in hot humid and horrible buggy conditions

There are many flooded houses on the lower parts of the island

My SIL took this video upon arrival

Information has been spotty,

with no power they have to reserve their cell phone batteries

The water came back on late Friday,

and they all immediately took showers and felt so much better!

They did bring a generator

and are using it to power fans and the refrigerator

They also cut screens from a screen door

that landed in our yard

and made screens for our windows

so they could open them up for cooler sleeping!

The grocery store is open so that helps, but gas is hard to come by.

I will keep updates coming as I get them,

I am truly grateful that I am not there

and don’t have to live in the very challenging conditions…

Thank you for praying for our little slice of Paradise…

Since we’ve been through this before,

I know with a little time and work

things will get better

🙏🙏🙏

I will be joining these fabulous parties and blogs:

Meal Plan Monday   Love Your Creativity  Over the Moon

Between Naps on the Porch,  Celebrate Your Story,

All About Home/ Common Ground Follow the Yellow Brick Home

 Tasty Tuesday   Oh My Heartsie Girl Turn About Tuesday 

 Full Plate Thursday  Centerpiece Wednesday Creative Crafts

Thursday Favorite Things  Creatively Crafty   Creative Cumpulsions

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