Hurricane update

First, it was bound to happen eventually but the timing for this was horrible: coming down the stairs last night from my 3:30 am feeding, I misjudged a step and rolled my ankle. Landed on my tailbone, got a rug burn, then promptly passed out. I like to pass out when I'm in any pain. I don't think I sprained my ankle, I can put weigh ton it and move it fine, but it has a nice dull throbbing sensation. If it weren't for the fact that all of Houston has shut down, I'd go to a doctor.

On to the storm:

the current forecast once again takes the storm right through my subdivision as a category one (this image shows my subdivision with a red arrow and the projected path with a blue line) . Google shows the track here; abc13.com also has some great up-to-date neighborhood-specific forecasts. We're in the town of Spring, the neighborhood of Klein, if you want to look us up after we lose power (zip 77379).

I want to clarify that we're no where near an area that they'd ever have a mandatory evacuation. They've only ordered an evacuation for zone 1, then zones 2 and 3 come more into the city... if we were in a zone it'd be like 6.
So far it has been a nice, pretty day. Sunny morning, very serene, though the wind is picking up. Kenny went to walmart this morning and of course the shelves were pretty much empty (they did however have crispix;)). No one is on the roads- EVERYONE got the day off work.

Overnight, they bumped it down to making landfall at category 2 and then recently back up to category 3. At least there is less talk of a Category 4. The current forecast for my little town of spring: "Sustained winds 75-100 mph, 5-10" rain with flooding in poor drainage areas, isolated tornadoes."
The last time my area saw wind like that was in like 1932. Still, it's not enough to cause significant structural damage, they say. A friend in the ward oh-so-helpfully told us that tornadoes are easy to predict because when they start coming, it sounds like a freight train. We don't have a single room in our house that does not have at least one external wall- not even a bathroom or a closet.

We've been warned to expect to be without power for at least three days- it isn't a matter of IF we lose power, it's more a matter of WHEN. Most of our preparations are around the expectation that we may be without power for a week or so.

We've got ice in our ice chest and don't plan on opening the fridge. We've got cash, water, food, a crank radio (thanks mom). We don't have wood to board up windows and aren't about to tackle home depot (not like they have any left, I suspect). If worse comes to worse we'll dismantle part of our back fence.

They just emailed that they've canceled church on Sunday for the whole Stake.

Last night I called the single ladies in my ward to check on how prepared they are. May I just say how glad I am we stress preparedness so much in our church? Of the 5 sisters I called, only 1 did not have what she needed. We're trying to make sure everyone has 72 hours of food and water and a fair amount of cash on hand (since without power credit and debit cards are useless).

We've got our cell phones, game boys, laptops and anything else charged. Baby and dog are freshly bathed:). We're making the most of electricity while we have it: vacuuming, making cookies...

Ill keep updating as long as we have power. Hopefully tomorrow morning my cell can at least text message Lori and she'll let you all know we're alright.