Winter Storm of 2021
February 22, 2021
I wanted to record this week in my life because it has been like no other week I’ve ever experienced since I live in TEXAS. I want to be able to look back and remember the weird stuff and the really good stuff that came out of it. There were good things because we didn’t let it get us down, we made it an adventure.
I wanted to record this week in my life because it has been like no other week I’ve ever experienced since I live in TEXAS. I want to be able to look back and remember the weird stuff and the really good stuff that came out of it. There were good things because we didn’t let it get us down, we made it an adventure.
Saturday, February 13 was pretty much a normal weekend. I had my three younger grands because my daughter had to work. My two oldest grands live here so they were here. The five kids and I spent the morning just hanging out playing. We knew the weather was going to get bad later that evening. The temps had already started to drop so we had a nice fire going in the fireplace. Our house was built in the 50’s and it has huge doorway openings with no doors so the house can get cold in the winter and hot in the summer. Since we have a private school there is “no end” to the toys and activities for the kids to do.
My oldest granddaughter has her own style. It was cold but she was running around in a gymnastics outfit. She has been watching me workout, and working out with me once she was old enough to imitate the moves. My new workout program has this door track, which we have attached to the wall. She decided she wanted to workout so she made up her own with the things I have been using. She was making sure she was breathing correctly and it was really very fun to watch her. That girl can do some killer burpees, too! I had the equipment set up because I was getting ready to workout. So I had to wait for her to finish before I could do mine. At first I was frustrated because I was ready to get started. These workout have these 12 minute sections in the workouts where you have to do as many reps of a series of exercises during that time. So I can have her working out WITH me during that. I decided to give her some time and watch her. She was doing a great job so I snapped some pictures. She never works out for too long because she is ready to do something else. I decided to be patient. I don’t want to discourage her from being active. I admit, some days I just want to workout.
We had a Parent’s Day Out that afternoon and evening. I posted pictures in a different post, so I won’t post them here. We only had one boy join us but my two grands were glad he came. Little did we know what the next week would really bring.
We had a Parent’s Day Out that afternoon and evening. I posted pictures in a different post, so I won’t post them here. We only had one boy join us but my two grands were glad he came. Little did we know what the next week would really bring.
Sunday, February 14 the kids woke up to the ground covered in snow! These two kids had not seen more than some small snow flurries. Seeing the ground and cars covered was a really exciting thing for them. We were excited, too. In Texas, it never lasts very long so we figured it would be gone in a day or two with the temps back up to normal. We let it snow for a couple more hours and then we bundled up and went out to play in the snow! The snow was very powdery, it didn’t pack. We didn’t get to build a snowman since it wouldn’t make a ball. We did throw the snow at each other and had fun doing it. The temperature wasn’t too bad at this point (I’m thinking in the upper 20’s or maybe even low 30’s) so we played a little while in the front yard and then some in the back yard. Then we went in to warm up by the fire and have some hot cocoa.
These girls had a great time in the snow. While the kids were warming up with Granddaddy by the fire, I ran outside with the girls to try and take pictures of them in the snow. Roxie decided playing fetch was a great idea so she kept bringing me her rope to throw. Zoie wouldn’t get away from me so I could take a good picture of her and she kept trying to jump up on me or on Roxie as she brought back the rope. I grabbed these few pictures and ran back inside for my cocoa and let them play for a little longer. They came back in shortly and went out periodically for short periods of time.
Monday morning around 2:30 a.m. the power was shut off. I found out because my granddaughter woke me up in the middle of the night to tuck her back in bed. I found out the power was off because her music wouldn’t turn back on. I never dreamed it would stay off because I didn’t know they TURNED IT OFF ON PURPOSE! I found out they turned power off and intended to “roll” it so that you had it off part of the time and back on part of the time. Let me share a “spoiler” for this story, we did NOT get the power “rolled” back on. It stayed off until…
When we woke up Monday morning it was 7 degrees! SEVEN!!! I don’t know that I have EVER been anywhere that the temp was that low. This IS Texas. We just don’t have that cold of weather. I layered the kids clothes so they were as warm as we could get them. We kept a fire going in the fire place because that was the only way we could get heat. We had a way to make sandwiches and had other snack type foods. I really wanted something warm. It dawned on me that we had camping cookware in the garage and mentioned it. He got it out and we decided to heat up some leftover taco soup and make some toast IN THE FIREPLACE! Brilliant! It tasted so good.
It was really kind of fun the first part of the day. Cold but I like being near the fireplace and just relaxing. I knew the weather would be weird on Monday so we let all the parents know we weren’t going to open school that day. When the power went off, I was glad we already decided that.
When we woke up Monday morning it was 7 degrees! SEVEN!!! I don’t know that I have EVER been anywhere that the temp was that low. This IS Texas. We just don’t have that cold of weather. I layered the kids clothes so they were as warm as we could get them. We kept a fire going in the fire place because that was the only way we could get heat. We had a way to make sandwiches and had other snack type foods. I really wanted something warm. It dawned on me that we had camping cookware in the garage and mentioned it. He got it out and we decided to heat up some leftover taco soup and make some toast IN THE FIREPLACE! Brilliant! It tasted so good.
It was really kind of fun the first part of the day. Cold but I like being near the fireplace and just relaxing. I knew the weather would be weird on Monday so we let all the parents know we weren’t going to open school that day. When the power went off, I was glad we already decided that.
The kids didn’t want the bean soup so they had sandwiches. We pretty much let them get cereal bars or granola bars any time they wanted since meals were not easy to do. We moved the rocker and the couch in front of the fireplace. The old wood wasn’t giving off much heat. And we noticed that the heat just didn’t stay IN the den so the only way to warm up was to sit close to the fire. We ate dinner and then got dressed for bed. The sun went down around 6:30 so we got dressed for bed and I made their bed up on the end of our kind size bed so that if they fell asleep on the couch we could just put them in bed. We didn’t want to leave the fire and it was so early. We enjoyed the first for at least an hour before moving the furniture away from the fire before going in our bedroom and getting under as many blankets as we could. They fell asleep and we carried them to bed.
I can tell you that having to go to the bathroom was not fun, The inside of the house stayed around 40 degrees during the day. I think it dropped a bit during the night but I didn’t check it. Getting undressed to go on a freezing toilet seat was terrible. And once I got IN the bed and covered up by the many blankets, I did NOT want to get out of the bed. It was actually difficult to to even have my hands and arms uncovered. The kids slept good despite the cold. Once they woke up I got them dressed again, in layers. Oh, still no power…
I can tell you that having to go to the bathroom was not fun, The inside of the house stayed around 40 degrees during the day. I think it dropped a bit during the night but I didn’t check it. Getting undressed to go on a freezing toilet seat was terrible. And once I got IN the bed and covered up by the many blankets, I did NOT want to get out of the bed. It was actually difficult to to even have my hands and arms uncovered. The kids slept good despite the cold. Once they woke up I got them dressed again, in layers. Oh, still no power…
On Tuesday morning we made bacon in the fireplace to eat with bagels and more toast. I began thinking about how the heat just went straight out of the den so we hung up a big blanket over the doorway and put rolled up mats in front of it to keep the heat in. John decided to heat up his coffee by putting his cup IN the fireplace. We spent the early morning in front of the fireplace trying to get warm. We heated water for coffee and cocoa in the fireplace. The temps stayed in single digits or teens that day. The 5 gallon jugs of water in the garage froze so we brought one in so it could thaw out. Still no word on US getting power back on. The blanket helped keep the warmth in the den. When we had to go outside the den you could really tell the difference.
We were so fortunate that on Monday someone brought us a bit of wood and some chili. Then on Tuesday afternoon, someone else brought us a BUNCH of amazing fire wood that burned long and hot! It actually warmed up the den enough to move the furniture a bit away from it and still feel it. I really didn’t do a whole lot during those days. I wanted to read but my job was to keep the kids from going nuts inside. Really, I felt blessed to have to quiet to think. No TV isn’t a bad thing. It did us all good, I think.
I am so used to working out every day but couldn’t on Monday and Tuesday since I didn’t have my TV. I did have the ipad but I was so cold and the den became our entire living space. On Tuesday we were so bored that I asked the kids if they wanted to work out with me. So we just started doing jumping jacks and knee lifts. We did some curls with their little weights. Finally we started doing burpees! They were doing amazing so I had to grab a picture of it. We did some different exercises for about 10 minutes and it wasn’t so cold in there anymore. It broke up the monotony.
Someone suggested putting potatoes to cook in the fire so that is one thing we made for dinner. We made about 10 tiny potatoes, some chicken sausage and some breakfast turkey sausage and some chili. That night we ate really good. The kids LOVED the potatoes! They would eat one so fast and ask for another one. That made me happy because it was a healthy meal instead of the hodge-podge we have all been eating. We heated up the leftovers for breakfast.
Someone suggested putting potatoes to cook in the fire so that is one thing we made for dinner. We made about 10 tiny potatoes, some chicken sausage and some breakfast turkey sausage and some chili. That night we ate really good. The kids LOVED the potatoes! They would eat one so fast and ask for another one. That made me happy because it was a healthy meal instead of the hodge-podge we have all been eating. We heated up the leftovers for breakfast.
We brought the playroom rug in the den to give the kids a warm spot to play. The brick floor can get really cold on a normal winter day. They had the Lego buckets to play with anytime they wanted. They often played for a bit then did something else before going back. They used a little lantern flashlight when the sun went down. We have so many Legos that made it a bit easier. One whole bucket is full of the odd pieces, people, wheels, etc. The other bucket has the standard pieces. They really did good without the TV. I didn’t let them play on my phone since I had to go to extreme measures, like sitting in my van to charge it.
Wednesday morning dawned with the power still out. But we were so thankful to have that wonderful firewood that heated up the room pretty quickly. Once again, we made due with our food and double layered our clothing. We kept hoping to get some of that “rolling” electricity but it never came back on until around noon on Wednesday. We were thrilled. The kids were thrilled. We hurried and plugged in our phones and started cooking some lunch in our wonderful toaster oven. We don’t have a full size working over but our toast oven has turned out to be quite amazing at cooking many things.
Right after the electric came back on our WATER WENT OFF!!! They said the water “ran out” because people filled up their tubs just in case. We put snow in the tub and we melted it to flush our toilets. We were brought some water bottles that helped us a great deal. After the water came back on Thursday, we instantly went to a boil mandate. Talk about crazy times! We didn’t open school until Friday but I had my grands on Thursday since she had to go to work. Her store didn’t have power until then so she was stuck at home, too. Part of the time without power and part of the time without water because her pipes burst. We were so fortunate that our pipes did not have issues.
Wednesday morning dawned with the power still out. But we were so thankful to have that wonderful firewood that heated up the room pretty quickly. Once again, we made due with our food and double layered our clothing. We kept hoping to get some of that “rolling” electricity but it never came back on until around noon on Wednesday. We were thrilled. The kids were thrilled. We hurried and plugged in our phones and started cooking some lunch in our wonderful toaster oven. We don’t have a full size working over but our toast oven has turned out to be quite amazing at cooking many things.
Right after the electric came back on our WATER WENT OFF!!! They said the water “ran out” because people filled up their tubs just in case. We put snow in the tub and we melted it to flush our toilets. We were brought some water bottles that helped us a great deal. After the water came back on Thursday, we instantly went to a boil mandate. Talk about crazy times! We didn’t open school until Friday but I had my grands on Thursday since she had to go to work. Her store didn’t have power until then so she was stuck at home, too. Part of the time without power and part of the time without water because her pipes burst. We were so fortunate that our pipes did not have issues.
Thursday was still very cold even though the power was back on. We live in an old house so it doesn’t warm up as much in the bigger rooms. We decided naptime would be in the library which is also the older two grands bedroom. My youngest daughter had been out of town since Monday so I was on my own with the five kids. We watched a movie and just had some down time.
We finally got to use our water again by Friday or Saturday. I can’t remember anymore! I waited too long to write this down. If I remember more things, I may come back and add to this post so I can document the entire adventure. Thanks for stopping by.
We finally got to use our water again by Friday or Saturday. I can’t remember anymore! I waited too long to write this down. If I remember more things, I may come back and add to this post so I can document the entire adventure. Thanks for stopping by.
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