Genesis 1:3

In early March, when we had some blustery storms during which we lost power for about 30 hours, we relied primarily on our oil lamps at night.

I love oil lamps. I've loved them since I was a teenager. I still have and cherish an oil lamp my parents gave me for Christmas when I was 16. At that age I often used it for lighting when doing homework in my bedroom.

While we have the makings for many such lamps, I keep three filled and on standby for power outages. Here I'm refilling them before storing them away. (The silver lamp with the handle on the right-hand side is the lamp my parents gave me for Christmas so many years ago.)

To fill the lamps, I find it easiest to pour the kerosene into a measuring cup. This way it won't splash everywhere when topping off the lamps.

Lamps shouldn't be overly full. Usually the base has some decorative marks and shouldn't be filled above those marks.

Because we live in a dusty household, I've taken to slipping plastic bags over the lamps...

...before storing them on top the fridge for quick access.

For additional (and harsher) lighting, we have some LED lanterns.

These can be powered by battery, by hand-cranking, by solar charging, or by electric charging, and put out a decent amount of light. Often they're preferable for reading in dark conditions.

After cleaning and storing away the three oil lamps, I decided to do something I haven't done in years: clean and prep the hanging oil lamp.

The story of this lamp goes back to when I flew out to Ohio with Older Daughter back in 2015 to drop her off at nanny school. During that trip, I made what I called my "pilgrimage" to Lehman's, the Amish goods store, which is something I'd wanted to see for years. On that trip, I admired a hanging oil lamp, but couldn't purchase it at the time since I couldn't get it home.

Unexpectedly a friend purchased it for me, and I love it. However in our old home, we never had a suitable place to hang it. Since moving here, I've stored it on top the fridge with the other lamps, but it was dusty and dirty and in desperate need of cleaning.

So I gave it a bath and filled it with oil.

Since it had been years since I'd used it, the wick needed a few minutes to absorb the kerosene.

Then I lit the lamp to make sure the wick was properly trimmed.

Don found me an "S" hook, and I hung the lamp next to the corner of the bookshelves.

It is such a thing of beauty that I almost can't wait for another power outage to use it.

So there you go. Genesis 1:3: Let there be light.

Wild wild wind

It's been a day of insane wind.

I'm an early riser, and when I got up at 4:30 am, it was calm. But at 5:27 am -- I looked at the clock -- I heard the wind crash into the house.

We knew this wind was coming yesterday, so we tried to get all water-related things done (when we lose power, we lose water since our well pump is electric). All day long the wind gained in strength until it was positively shrieking and shaking the house.

Early this morning I caught up on all the laundry.

After daylight, I made sure to clean and stock Polly's and Matilda's pens with food and water. Moving hay across the yard during wind would have virtually impossible later in the day.

Don made sure a few days' worth of split firewood was stacked on the porch.

We went out several times throughout the day to make sure the stock tanks stayed brim-full.

You can see the wind blowing the water sideways as I filled this tub.

The chickens prudently stayed in whatever shelter they could find. The wind was so strong it literally tipped a couple of chickens over and sent them rolling while outside.

In the process of installing a window at the far end of the new barn annex, Don temporarily put up some OSB to keep the wind from shrieking through the barn (this end of the annex faces into the prevailing wind).

Let me tell you, this made things much snugger in the barn.

Concerned that the high profile of the bee hive might cause the wind to tip it over, Don and I strapped it down.

If it looks like the end of the strap is blurry, that's because it was whipping in the wind.

I filled up two pitchers of water for immediate kitchen use in case we lost power. We have about fifty gallons of stored water in the house, but it's always nice to have fresh.

We have an old refrigerator we haven't yet recycled by the old barn. Unsurprisingly, it got blown over...

...and sheared the door handle off the barn door.

Late in the afternoon, just near dusk, a smaller dead tree went crashing over the compost pile.

Fortunately no chickens were caught underneath (they were all cowering in their coop by this point), but it did freak out a couple of cows who were nearby.

The lights have been flickering all day but amazingly the power has stayed on. We have an oil lamp lit just in case (and others on standby), but so far so good.

The wind is supposed to die down around midnight, and tomorrow is forecast to be calm. Such are the vagaries of weather -- all we can do is roll with the punches.

UPDATE: The power went out at 6 pm. The Spokane news is telling people to "shelter in place." What a storm!

I'm going to shut my laptop down to save battery power. Good thing we spent the day prepping for this!

Violent storm

Holy cow, we had one hum-dinger of a thunderstorm that rolled through yesterday. It was totally unexpected and caught almost everyone by surprise, both by its very existence as well as its ferocity.

I had taken Younger Daughter to her violin lesson in a nearby town and watched as dark clouds started pushing in, but it wasn't until we were driving home that it hit.

Seldom have I seen such torrential rain and fierce wind. The windshield wipers were going full-blast and still it was hard to see.

The lake had choppy whitecaps pushed by the wind.

The heavy rain lasted about ten minutes and then eased off, but the wind was still high. We rounded a corner and came to a stop because a small tree had fallen across the road. A semi truck and a car had stopped and the drivers were pulling the debris off the road.

By the time we made it to our own dirt road the storm cell had passed, leaving torn branches and debris everywhere...

...including this tree which snapped in half.

A local farmer, whom we hired to cut, swath, and bale some adjacent property for grass hay, had brought out some equipment but hadn't yet begun to cut (thankfully).

The last of the storm, heading out.

We arrived home to find minor chaos. The power was out, of course. Don and Older Daughter had run around trying to batten down hatches, but the wind blew from the northwest (rather than the usual southwest) and poured water even through shut windows because the wind was so strong. Every towel in the house was soaked because they ran around mopping up as fast as they could.

Unfortunately in their haste, they forgot to check the upstairs windows... and our bedroom faces north. A jar on the windowsill had half an inch of water on it and the wind blew the rain in so hard that the carpet was wet -- soaked and squishy -- six feet into the room. Our bed was mostly protected by the bedspread, which was quite wet. We pulled it off and found the sheets and blankets below slightly damp but not bad. Our clock radio, however, is toast. (It's 24 years old, so it's served us well.)

The rain came down so hard it made little debris dams in the driveway.

Of course the garden got battered, but not as badly as we'd feared. The potatoes were blown over, but they're recover.

Here's the corn. It may or may not make it.

Tomatoes. I think they'll be okay.

Brussel's sprouts. Again, I think they'll be okay. Nothing snapped.

The loafing shed against one of the garden fences was trashed, however. Absolutely destroyed.

Sparky and hew new baby had some shelter from the barn awning, but the wind was blowing sideways so they still got wet.

The good news is the storm dropped the temperature thirty degrees -- from 90F down to 60F -- a welcome relief from the unrelenting heat we've been having.

The bad news is there are thousands of acres of hay around the county that are cut and drying on the ground. With temps shooting straight back up into the 90s, this hay stands a very good chance of rotting. It could be salvaged if it's turned and fluffed, but there aren't enough farmers to turn and fluff so much cut hay before it starts to rot. Breaks my heart.




Sunset.

Since the power was out, the chickens were reluctant to go into the darkened coop. I lit the hurricane lamp and tied it inside, so they'd have an incentive to go indoors. (Of course we removed it before locking them in for the night.)

The girls played the game Life by lamplight.

Deep in the night, at 2:30 am, the hard-working electric company workers came slowly down the road, lights flashing, searching for damage. They came and went, then returned again at 3:30 am. Power was on by 3:45 am. My hat's off to these guys -- they are some of society's unsung heroes.

Unsurprisingly after such a storm, the morning was foggy...

...and today was cooler (high 80s) though the temps are supposed to climb again tomorrow and for the next few days.

Damage reports have been coming in. A tree came down and clipped a corner of a neighbor's house, but it can be repaired.

Another neighbor who built a small studio that was meant to be moved somewhere else, had it totally flipped upside down. No one was in it, thankfully.

I decided it was time to wash, and top off all the oil lamps, which tend to get dusty with disuse.

Altogether things could have been worse, though I still feel terrible for the farmers who lost their hay crop.