Monday, January 28, 2008

Snow, Cold and Ice


I was sitting in my eating nook last night, with my family. I was looking out the window and the snow and ice storm that was raging outside. The temperature plunged to -28 degrees C, and with the wind chill factor it was -45 degrees C. We were all sitting together eating a wonderful Sunday dinner of Roast pork, noodles, caesar salad, freshly baked buns and sweet potatoes. We had a fire roaring in our fireplace, and we had classical music playing in the background with our overhead kitchen speakers. And I just couldn't help but feel so grateful that we had this wonderful, warm house to live in with yummy food to eat and I just felt so blessed to be able to have that for my family.

I was worried that the power might go out last night because of all of the wind, cold and ice, so I made everyone take a flashlight to bed and bring an extra blanket into their rooms to have by their beds. I made a mental note of where all of the candles were and where all of our emergency supplies was and what we would do if the power went out in such cold conditions. It made me realize that there are a few things that I do need to make sure that we have in case of an emergency in a cold, snowstorm like that. I had a hard time sleeping because I wanted to make sure that everyone was okay (and they were), and I was so grateful this morning when I woke up and even though it is still EXTREMELY cold, (-32) at least the wind and the ice have stopped blowing.

Everyone talks about getting a food storage ready and an emergency kit ready, and it finally hit home the importance of that while I was up, worrying about my kids. It was so nice and cozy in our warm bed, but how warm would it have been without our furnace working? I realized that it isn't in good weather that you lose power, it is in the cold, yucky stuff, and so I need to be prepared for that. If anyone has any suggestions on what they have in their emergency kits for the cold, I would love to hear it! I just don't know how you would survive in your house when it is -45 outside with the wind!!!

1 comments:

The Mom said...

It would have been nasty cold, as we can attest to having spent the night in Grandma and Grandpa's motorhome without any heat (luckily they had an electric blanket and the kids all had sleeping bags rated to 20 degrees F ;) They weren't too bad off - but even at 42 F which is a lot warmer than what you'd be at, it was nasty freezing!

Glad everything turned out well!