Tropical Storms

If you have been keeping track of the weather happening here in Florida, you will know that we have been covered by Tropical Storm Debby since late Saturday night and all day Sunday.

Hurricanes, tropical storms and tropical depressions are just part of the "landscape" of living in Florida. We always keep canned goods, dry goods, and lots of water on hand just in case. Candles are an absolute necessity.

When I was single, I could care less about these storms. They meant absolutely nothing to me except for a day off of work.

The year I got married, we had two hurricanes almost back to back that affected our area. Brian and I lost power in our home and stayed in my parents' home until our power came back on and the storm had passed. Now that I was married, I was a little more concerned about the hurricanes because my love was out driving around in the pre-storm weather.

When I became a mother, my whole outlook on hurricane season changed. I began praying harder than ever that God would keep these storms as far from us as possible and if we had to have them, then to just keep us safe.

At the end of May, we had a Tropical Storm, Beryl, that dumped quite a bit of rain on us. Now this weekend, we had Debby that pretty much sat on us for two straight days. We as a family were not affected by the storm, thank the Lord, but there was a lot of flooding in our county and in many of the surrounding counties. A few tornados touched down in several different areas, but there has only been one reported loss of life, a mother who was cradling her little girl to protect her.

Because of this pretty routine pattern in the weather, an emergency plan is so important to have. We have our plan in place, and on Sunday as our county was put under a tornado warning, I went over our plan with Addie.

"If the storm gets really bad (tornado in our area), I want you to get into the bathtub. Mommy and Ian are going to get into the bathtub, too, and Daddy is going to put Ian's mattress on top of us (to shield us from falling debris). Then, Daddy is going to hide until the storm passes."

"And then I turn on the water?" she asked.

I seriously had to keep from laughing out loud. "No! We don't turn on the water. We are not taking a bath. We are hiding from the bad storm."

"Oh, okay."

I decided that keeping my cell phone on me at all times during these storms is important, also. This week, my goal is to clean out Ian's closet, to give us one more great area to hunker down in, in case of another TD, TS, or hurricane..... or just one of our Florida summertime severe thunderstorms.

Welcome to the Sunshine State!