What a roller coaster ride! Seriously, we went on roller coasters during Spring Break. Every year, we buy a family membership to some sort of attraction so that we can take the kids for weekend trips. This year, instead of getting a Houston Zoo membership, we opted for Six Flags. The worst part about this whole story is that I forgot my camera. So, there are no eye popping photos of Kate screaming her head off on the Boomerang, no tilted-crazy angled shot of Reagan and Georgi on their first experience of the log-ride; nevertheless the kids had a great time at Six Flags in San Antonio, and I think it's going to be a favorite summer destination.
Talking about summer, we are getting super excited for Tanner's internship. We still haven't found an abode for him, but we're confident that we'll be able to get something rented in the next couple of months. We're rearranging our house so that Emily has a place to sleep with hopefully minimal allergies to our cat. The girls are getting excited that someone is going to spend a WHOLE summer with them. They've got plans, like swimming and parks and bowling and Popsicles. Lots of Popsicles.
While y'all in the Northwest were experiencing snow, we were turning on the air conditioning. I just couldn't stand the 80 degrees while playing and teaching violin, of course, neither could my students, so I had a good excuse. We had to set up the kiddie pool, and the girls rummaged around for their bathing suits. It looks like the beach is definitely going to be on the list of must do things this year.
Earlier this month, we had a huge storm roll into town. Did you know that the emergency broadcasting system actually works? Yup. Turn on the radio and the little neenerneener sound occurs and then you get a weather update. Yeah, I had no idea, until I moved here that people actually rely on that annoying broadcast. To me, it has always represented a high piercing interruption to great music, and is always followed by the words, "this is a test..." Not so in Texas. They don't need tests, cuz they use it quite frequently. Like earlier this month. We were so worried that we had the girls sit in our closet (the only space in the house without outdoor walls) while wearing their bike helmets and warm clothes. We dumped water bottles and dry food rations all around them and instructed them on what they would need to do if we got hit. We really weren't sure if we were gonna get hit by a tornado. The wind was whipping around the house so hard that it was shaking and the lights kept flickering on and off. We kept hearing roars of thunder and wind and loud cracks of lightning. I called my mom and told her that just in case something happened, I wanted to make sure that she knew that we loved her. Needless to say, the storm passed, and we made it through unscathed.
We found out that almost 9 inches of rain fell in just 12 hours. We were flooded up to the bottom step of our porch, and it would have been dangerous to stand in the street because you might get swept away. You know those stories of black flood waters? I got to see them, and they are indeed black. No exaggerating there.
I do love the way storms roll into this town. They don't sweep in. They don't meander or trickle. You can actually see the clouds rolling in the sky like big huge piles of batting, and then once that all gets settled into place the whole thing wakes up and starts shaking the sky. The strangest thing is that it can be pouring down rain and still warm. There have been times when I've had to run the air conditioner during a rain storm just to keep the house under 90 degrees. It's my kind of weather. Today it's raining and about 70 and my feet are cold.
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