What a night!

So I had a post planned for tonight about the FABULOUS new organizer we made....but we had such a crazy night I have to blog about that instead.

It started off when we decided to take the kids into town to get their pictures taken. Keep in mind that "into town" means 45 minutes. Photo sessions in and of itself are crazy and I try to avoid it as much as I can...picking out the matching outfits, trying to schedule an appointment and keep the kids bruise-free and healthy until then, trying to keep them clean, forcing them to smile for a stranger...NOT FUN! But it had been a really long time since we had a professional family photo taken, so alas, into town we went.

The kids were ROCK STARS! I was in awe! They smiled and laughed. They held their poses. The photos turned out awesome and it was actually an enjoyable experience. On our way out of the mall, we got a phone call saying severe weather was popping up in the area and we should stay in town so we didn't get stuck on the way home with no place to stop. So we decided we'd run to Menards to return something since we had to stick around for awhile anyways.

When we got to Menards, it was about 5:00, dark and starting to lightly rain. It took us awhile to find what we needed and so by the time we were going to leave, it was raining really hard. Jeremy had to make a really quick decision for our family on what to do. On one hand, it's definitely more appealing to stay in warm, dry safety and wait it out...on the other hand, it was supposed to storm all night and being stuck in Menards with two small kids could get old fast. He decided we should try to go for it and we ran out to the van and pulled out.

The second we got out of the parking lot, it started monsooning (yep, that's a word). It. was. ridiculous. Jeremy isn't the type of guy to get rattled easily and we were waiting at a red light and he was starting to get really agitated. The sky was green with black clouds, the street signs were blowing back and forth, and it was raining so hard we could barely see. There was no way we could drive home in this. We thought we'd try to make it to the mall since we could entertain the kids easier there. Nope. We couldn't even make it that far. We pulled into Kohl's since it was nearby, parked close to the door and ran in.

I was wearing flip flops and a white t-shirt. Not exactly prepared to run through a monsoon carrying children. I thought we were going to get blown away, or I would lose a shoe, or something equally disastrous....instead we just got really really wet. I had the forethought to grab the diaper bag so at least the kids were able to change into dry clothes. We kept them occupied for a half hour looking at toys when we got word that it was mostly over and we could try again to drive the 45 minutes home.

So off we went. The kids were really shook up, but we had managed to avoid mentioning the big scary T-word because Micah is absolutely petrified of tornadoes. Like, he asks me to check the weather before he'll go outside, even when it's sunny out. So we'd only driven a few blocks, when all of a sudden we hear tornado sirens. So we pulled over AGAIN! This time at Fleet Farm, where they had shut down the store and were making everyone stand together up front for "safety." Apparently their idea of "safety" involves forcing everyone to stand by the big giant glass doors and watch the impending doom. I don't know if the weather had really gotten that much worse or if it was just a more anxious group of people, but they were all VERY loud about their concerns. "I just got a text that there's a HUGE tornado coming right OUR way!!!" "Well my uncle's cousin told me that they had baseball size hail and that this is the WORST storm they've EVER seen!" Thanks guys. So much for keeping our kids calm. When the sirens started sounding off again, they told everyone to head into the bathrooms and take cover. Micah was really concerned about this but I told him that it was just in case we needed to go potty. Which they did. So convenient! After about 20 minutes of waiting and constant updates from everyone's phone...thank you technology...they freed us and we tried again to make it home.

This time successfully! We're now dry and warm in our pajamees (as Liliana calls them) and chalking it up to a great adventure. I have no doubt that Micah will have nightmares tonight, but at least we were safe and there wasn't any actual tornadoes. Micah said that he is "very proud of himself." And I am too.