As many of you know, Hurricane Irene swept up the east coast on Saturday afternoon and evening, bringing lots of wind and rain along with it. Sadly, our neighborhood didn’t fare very well with high wind gusts slamming a bunch of giant trees down on power lines, roads, and even homes.
Thankfully, our house was spared. But many of our neighbors and friends weren’t so lucky. It broke our hearts to look out from our patio to see that a tree in our neighbor’s yard had fallen onto their home (it easily could have hit ours if it fell in the other direction).
Thankfully although they were both home with their two dogs at the time, no one was hurt. But parts of their house are flooded and shattered, and we’re so sad for them – and anyone else whose family or house has been affected.
When it came to what we did during the storm, we just hunkered down at home between 6pm to midnight when the winds were at their worst. And after hearing/seeing a few large trees come down on our block we decided to sleep in interior rooms, just to have a bit more protection in the event that something fell on our house (since our basement is below grade, we worried it could flood – which is why we opted for interior rooms over lower level spaces). Clara slept in the hallway in a pack and play (since it was insulated by rooms on all sides)…
… and John and I dragged the not-as-heavy-as-ours mattress from the guest room into the kitchen (which is also in the middle of our house).
Thankfully our basement didn’t flood and although we have a bunch of branches and debris to clean up on our yard (along with a few larger tree limbs in the back) we feel incredibly fortunate.
We’re still without power along with what we hear are around 800,000 other Richmonders (ours went out around 5pm on Saturday, so we’re on our third day without it). We’re hoping to have it restored soon, but realistically know that it could be a few more days or even one to two weeks (a statement that they just released alludes to the latter of those timelines). A number of trees on the power lines in our neighborhood means that it might be a while for us, so our blogging schedule may be a bit irregular until our area is back up and running. We also might not be able to keep up with comments, facebook, and twitter as much as we’d like (since you know we’re usually so chatty), but we do have plans to stop in with the afternoon giveaway as usual, and hope that everyone else who is dealing with any sort of storm repercussions is doing ok.
Oh and we felt compelled to check on our first house and were so relieved to see that it appeared to make it through. Although there was a huge tree on the house across the street. Scary stuff.
Between this and the earthquake on Tuesday, we’re ready to be done with natural disasters for a while – especially since it’s rare for either of them to affect Richmond so much (the last major storm in our area was Isabel in 2003, and most Richmonders were without power for about a week). Let’s hope we’re back up and running sooner than that. Luckily a few of our relatives do have power and enough food/water to go around. In fact here’s Clara on Sunday morning after the storm passed and we headed over to Grammy’s house, where there’s power, glorious power (which seems to be a rarity in our city). We joked that all of the chaos drove her into the arms of her cousin John…
… where they watched a video together and had a grand old time.
Thanks so much to everyone on twitter, facebook, and here in the comments who checked in on us this weekend. You have no idea how much we appreciate the love and send it right back atcha. And for anyone else who was affected, we’d love to hear from you about how you’re doing.
Chelsea J says
Oh dear! Glad you are OK. Here in Raleigh there was limited damage so we are counting our lucky stars and sending good vibes to all affected.
Elizabeth says
Yay glad you guys are safe!!
But whoa, hope your neighbor’s situation is cleared up fast!
Clara is so adorable in those pictures.
Amy @ this DIY life says
So glad ya’ll are okay! Being in the midwest, we see a lot of tornadoes and windstorms and 3 years ago our city was covered in 32 feet of water. The natural disasters are terrible, but every time they happen (a few times each summer) good comes out of them. Neighbors and neighborhoods are brought together and I love to see people helping people out of the goodness of their hearts. I get all choked up thinking about it. I know you’ll see the same around you…just think about all those DIY projects you’ll see. Plus, the trees will be all cut up just in time for end of summer neighborhood bonfires too ;)
Side note: last week I asked you how you stay motivated on a nightmare project. I finished it! It’s my guest post on Lovely Crafty Home (http://www.lovelycraftyhome.com/) today if you want to check it out between cleaning up.
YoungHouseLove says
Wahooo! Congrats! So excited that you finished it!
xo,
s
sally says
Oh and when counting natural disasters you forgot the burning of the Dismal Swamp – or maybe you haven’t been inflicted with the smoke and burning eyes that it’s causing all though the Hampton Roads Area. Hopefully Irene might have put a stop of the fires that have been burning for weeks.
Mike at The Big Stick says
Knowing how organized you guys are – I wonder if you have thought about putting together a family emergency kits (go-bag, food stores, etc). It would make for an interesting series of posts.
YoungHouseLove says
We definitely have been thinking more about being prepared after the earthquake and Irene. Unfortunately we don’t feel anywhere near “expert” enough to advise folks about that stuff (we’d probably do it all wrong) but we’ve put out a call to true experts since we’d love to share that info!
xo
s
Krystle says
Clara and her cousin are sooo cute together =) Glad you guys are safe!
Leah says
Glad everyone at your place is okay!! My parents live in the southside of Richmond near your area and got their power restored late last night — here’s hoping you’re back up soon, too! I live down in Colonial Heights (got my power back last night, also), and my house backs up on a large forested area. Let’s just say there’s a lot more sky view from my back deck now… thankfully the ones close enough to reach my house stayed up or fell in a different direction. My neighbors across the street told me they kept worrying one was going to go down on my house — they are on a hill, and had a much better view than I did of it. Definitely some damage in our neighborhood, but nothing as devastating as all those beautiful old trees that went down in yours.
sally says
http://www.newsplex.com/home/headlines/Irene_Soaks_Great_Dismal_Swamp_Fire_128559628.html
Laura C in Indy says
So glad you’re safe! When I heard about the hurricane hitting Richmond I mentioned to my husband that I hoped the “youngsters”(the only thing I call you) would be ok. He said “I didn’t know they lived in Richmond.” I just thought it funny that he knew who I was talking about immediately. Guess he does listen to me! Anwyay, glad you’re safe and sound.
Miss Em says
I’m glad to hear you guys are doing well! I was definitely thinking of you this weekend. My family is in upstate NY and they are getting hit hard by flash flooding. So far so good for them but you never know what’s coming down the pipeline. :\
Be safe!
Emily
meredith says
soooo glad you all are safe and were spared a lot of damage! heartbreaking for your neighbors and everyone else affected by this hurricane. :( hope y’all get it cleaned up soon!
Ashleuy says
We survived here in Norfolk with our power remaining the whole time
despite some flickering. However, our internet has been off since Saturday night (which is why I’m commenting via my Blackberry) but I’m not complaining, my husband and I were really fortunate and I know a lot of people are out of power. Hope your lights come on soon and I’m thankful for all the out-of-state linemen that have come to help (my father was a lineman and I know how taxing storms can be on them). Just up the street from us there’s a bunch of Kentucky Utility linemen working with Dominion to get everyone’s power restored!
Amanda @ Our Humble A{Bowe}d says
Wow, that’s crazy! We’re so sorry for your neighbors and friends, but glad to see you’re all okay. Take care!
chelseyadele says
Glad your all okay! I know how scary it can be, we recently lost everything in the Joplin tornado & as far as power goes our snow storm last winter left us without power for almost 2 weeks. Praying for everyone around you!
Jnbean says
So glad you guys are okay! My thoughts go out to you and and especially your neighbors’ homes that were damaged. I grew up in Northern Virginia and still can’t believe the week you all had – unreal! Take care and hope your power comes on real soon!
Sarah @ Redhead in Ruffled Flats says
How devastating to look around the neighborhood and see all of that destruction! My heart goes out to all of those affected. I’m very happy you all are okay and hope the power comes on sonn!
Becca says
I’m so glad to hear you are largely spared from the wide-spread destruction. :( Even my father, up in NJ, had about a foot of water in his basement. So sad for your neighborhood, but my fingers are crossed for you and yours! Thanks for still keeping us updated!
Reenie says
Oh gosh glad y’all are okay ~ I was thinking about you. Adorabe pics of Clara and John :)
angel valerio says
I’m so glad you guys are okay. I was thinking of you and praying for you.
Kristen says
Glad you guys managed to stay safe and that your home didn’t sustain any damage. Those pictures of Clara cuddling with her cousin are adorable!!
Sarah K. @ The Pajama Chef says
glad you guys are okay! and that last picture of clara is precious :)
Melanie says
Glad you’re all safe. Clara looks adorable in those pics.
I’ve been through several hurricanes down here in South Louisiana (Andrew, Katrina, Gustav). All you can do is get your supplies, hunker down, and wait. It’s always surreal seeing how arbitrary the damage seems afterward! You may know a storm is coming, but the damage is so unpredictable. But hey, houses and possessions can be replaced, and you’ve still got each other. :)
Alex says
Glad you guys fared okay! and i have to say – those cousin pics are preeetty adorable :)
Rachel says
Wow. I’m sorry to hear what’s happened in your neighborhood. I live a little over an hour north of you guys and we didn’t have nearly as much damage. I hope you get your power back sooner than later! I’m sure that is quite a pain.
The pics of Clara and her cousin are tooooo adorable!
Shreya says
Glad to know that you are okay and have family and friends around. Hopefully the rest of your neighborhood and the entire East coast will recover soon.
miriam says
Glad to hear you guys (and your house) made it through the storm okay! I live in a basement apartment in DC and was SO SURE we would get flooded, but we got super lucky– no flood, no power outages, and not a lot of damage in our neighborhood.
My boyfriend and I are supposed to be going to Richmond on Saturday for a Labor Day weekend mini-vacation… how is the downtown area faring?
YoungHouseLove says
We haven’t ventured down there for ourselves yet, but hear parts of Monument/The Fan are very sad looking due to lots of trees on brownstones. I’d imagine as folks get power back it might get better when it comes to restaurants and other “attraction” stuff. Some areas in the southside don’t seem like they’ll be getting it back as soon, but hopefully downtown will be up and running by Labor Day weekend!
xo,
s
Robin @ Our Semi Organic Life says
As of yesterday evening some of the downtown had power and traffic lights. The capital and VCU MVC campus areas all had power and up and running. Hope it helps!
YoungHouseLove says
Oh that’s great news!
xo,
s
miriam says
Thanks for all the info! I also heard that Dominion is set to get the lights back on for 90-95% of customers by Friday, so we’re going to make the trip down. I’m back to being excited again, yay!
YoungHouseLove says
That’s great! Yay Dominion! They’re working so hard and it’s much appreciated!
xo,
s
Carolyn says
How are you guys making blog posts?! I’m guessing your iPhones? That must be pretty tedious and finger-numbing! My parents are in central Jersey and thankfully didn’t get hit too bad. Just suffering from lack of power … I think they had a “hurricane party” at the neighbors last night so everyone could sit in the dark with candles and such together. So glad you guys are ok!
YoungHouseLove says
Yes, my iPhone does work sometimes – although service has been spotty due to some cell tower weirdness from the storm. We’re also “stealing” internet from John’s mom and dad whenever we can (they miraculously never lost power) but obviously can’t be at their house every hour of the day (we have things to take care of at home along with juggling the baby and the dog) so we’re sort of intermittently logging on an trying to figure things out at home.
xo,
s
Misty says
I’m in tears reading your update. Happy tears knowing that you guys are all okay. I was so worried about y’all. Sad tears seeing your neighbors houses. My heart breaks for them. I can’t imagine the fear that went through their heads as a tree fell on their home. I hope your electricity is restored sooner rather than later. Once again, I am so happy y’all are okay.
Diana says
Keeping you in our thoughts.
Kay says
Hey, so glad to hear that you are all okay! Smart move to sleep in the interior ~ our apartment is right on the edge of a building, so we just moved closer to interior walls.
I hope that clean up goes quickly for your area!
We are also without power, and they are expecting 10-20 days… how nice of them to estimate so long. But our heavily wooded area was thinned out during the storm, and I think that the power lines are made of yarn or something because they are super broken…
Thank you for posting even during a weather disaster!
Kay says
I forgot to mention that we are in central Massachusetts, so the storm hit us yesterday, and our power went out around 10am… 24 hours and counting…
Melissa's Heart and Home says
Sherry it was awful here in coastal NC as well. I thought about you guys when they said Richmond. My prayers are with you and your area for a swift recovery. Stay safe.
Warmly, ~Melissa
heartlandfarmhouse says
GLAD to hear that all 3 of you are safe & sound at least!
Sorry about the neighbors that is SAD!
Rebecca
Another blog that I LOVE!!! http://farmgirlpaints.blogspot.com/ she just moved to Richmond last month. Boy what a welcome she received…poor girlie! BUT, thank goodness they are safe too! :)
heather says
Holy….I’m so glad you guys are ok but so sad for the clear madness around where you live. They talked about Richmond, on the radio up here in Maine, yesterday and how at least 75% of the city and outer areas are without power. :( We don’t have any either and don’t expect it for a few more days, a tree fell on a line and caught fire. We had a tree fall across the street from our house, about 1/2 way across the street. Had it been a larger one it would have crashed into our bedroom and livingroom since our house is close to the road. We have some trees down, lots of branches, leaves, etc but nothing bad (thankfully). Most of the down trees just fell into other trees but we have one or two widow-makers hanging in our tree line so we’ll have to wait for them to blow down on their own. I can’t even imagine if we had hurricane force winds.
I’m glad you guys are ok and your neighbors weren’t hurt.
Kim S says
That scene looks familiar down here in Florida. We haven’t gotten a bad hit in several years (knock on wood!) but all those trees down and debris in the road reminds me of our last bad hurricane when we were in college. Of course then, it was more of a party because classes were cancelled and about 12 of us just camped out in one house for a few days…but it was still miserable not to have power all that time! Glad to hear you all are alright though, and here’s hoping you get your power back soon!
Corinne says
So glad you guys are okay! That had to have been frightening, seeing trees down on your neighbors’ homes. Really happy to hear that everyone is doing as well as can be expected after such a storm.
I lived in Annapolis, MD and southern MD for about 13 years and went through a number of hurricanes (at least two of them I was on a sailboat in the middle of the Bay…NOT FUN). Now I’m in Ohio, and it was so surreal to watch the news and see all these areas and landmarks I recognized being slammed with the storm, while it was gorgeous, sunny, and breezy here! My parents still live in southern Calvert County in Maryland, and they lost power around 4:30pm on Saturday. I became the go-to gal for storm updates the rest of the night!
Thankfully, both my parents are fine, and their normally skittish dog did GREAT during the hurricane. Their house was spared any damage, but sadly, my step-dad’s truck was the victim of a large tree falling right across the center! The cab is decimated and the front axel is broken. They were able to cut the tree apart to remove it from the truck, but it may be a few days before a tow truck can reach them. My step-dad essentially runs his business from that truck and uses it to get to everything on the East Coast (he teaches water rescue classes and plays with the guys who do those things from Florida all the way to Maine and even Alaska). He had only had it about 6 weeks too! Their community is huge but extremely wooded, so there are trees down everywhere. It may be at least a week before power is restored. They can’t even leave to go to any of their friends’ homes with electricity!
meghan says
So happy that everyone is doing well and seems safe! Adorable picture of the two little dolls snuggled up during a movie :) Clara thankfully seems unscathed by the storms!
Laura says
So glad you hear you’re all OK– we braced for the storm up here in inland CT but are so thankful that we got nothing more than a “bad storm”– no power loss, no flooding, no damage. We’ll keep you (and all those negatively affected by Hurricane Irene) in our thoughts and prayers.
Nikki says
So glad you guys escaped relatively un-scathed!! Have you seen if your first house made it through?
YoungHouseLove says
We did check it out – thankfully it’s still ok (from the front at least) but the house across the street has a tree on it. So scary!
xo,
s
Kristin @ everythingZamora says
So glad to hear your home was spared, praying for your neighbors who weren’t. Those trees can create such damage, it was nice to hear your neighbor had her sense of humor through it all. Thankfully everyone was safe and kept from harm.
Jenn says
I have the exact same sofa that Clara and John are sitting on in the last pic :) glad yall survived the storm! we had gorgeous weather all weekend here in SC!!
Julie says
So glad you are all okay! I feel badly for your neighbors. Does the city come and clear the fallen trees or do homeowners have to do it? It must be a massive effort to even start cleaning up after a hurricane. Here’s hoping things will get back to normal as soon as possible for everyone!
YoungHouseLove says
Homeowners do it individually along with insurance assistance. It’s such a mess because there aren’t enough tree guys to remove trees from homes, so they’re still on them (and folks are in a waiting list of sorts). Here’s hoping they’re taken care of soon!
xo,
s
Steph @ Birdhouse says
Was thinking about you this weekend as I tracked the storm on the NY Times. So glad to hear that you are all okay! What a week for you! I hope everything gets back to normal fairly soon for you.
Amy in Pittsburgh says
So glad you guys are OK and have somewhere to go with power! Looks like Clara is none the worse for wear–that picture with baby John is HILARIOUS. Hope Burger wasn’t too traumatized either!
Bethany says
crazy pix!!! so glad you guys are doing ok!!!!!! Love the clara pix! she looks happy and relaxed!
Gina says
Happy to hear that all is safe at the young house love home. So sad that there is so much damage to others all along the east coast. This past week brought back memories from Hurricane Bob which we somehow survived while tent camping in Myrtle Beach. I posted a picture on my blog of my dad and I swimming in that mess.
For the time being, enjoy a few days away from the tech world! It’s so peaceful without all the noise!
http://beatbeatheartbeat.com
Lacey says
Glad you guys are ok! Keep us updated on your neighborhood restoration.
jen k says
So glad you guys are okay! The pictures of Clara and her cousin are darling! What a treat to have family so close. It’s really a gift for you all!
Pam the Goatherd says
Glad to hear you and the house made it through OK. I survived Hurricane Andrew (along with a bunch of other ‘canes in the 35 years I lived in Miami). We were without power for two weeks. Spam on the grill is pretty tasty after all that time…
Hopefully you’ll have your power back on soon.
Kate says
I live in Newton, MA where a state of emergency was declared for the town on Sunday because of downed trees and power outages. Fortunately, power has been restored, and I’ve heard of only one huge tree that came down across a road but apparently caused no harm to any people or homes. I, too, am thankful to have been spared any major damage. The wind was scary at times, though. So glad to hear you guys are safe and sound!
Bree says
So glad that you and your crew are OK! We wondered about how you were all weekend. We were in Lowe’s talking to a sales associate with family in Richmond. She was telling us that her niece told her mom to go out and get oreos to prepare for the hurricane :)