We honestly did not think that hurricane Irene was going to be a problem…. well, about 10 years ago it wouldn’t have been!  Alas, our fair state has let the road maintenance go and have allowed the trees to grow unchecked, hence…. a week without power (for most people).

Since we didn’t think it was going to be such a problem we didn’t put a whole lot of thought into preparations.  Thank goodness we did think of the 50 gallon barrels we have hanging around the farm, kept for various reasons.  They served us well as…. well… a well!

One of our children, when I said “do we have a short hose for siphoning”, said “hang on..” and ran into the house and came back out with her fish tank “vacuum”.   She promptly got a suction going and we were able to fill buckets!!  We had 3 of the 50 gallon barrels filled and about 20 gallons of drinking water in water coolers.

We hunkered down, thinking “we got a handle on this”  Pulled out appropriate reading material 

depending on your age.. of course

I even banged out a few letters… real letters, the kind you use paper and pen (or pencil if you prefer) and put a stamp on.. I did have to walk to the post office the next day to buy said stamps 🙂

Once we knew the bulk of the wind was over we walked around to check things out.  Our beloved crab apple tree

took out our “pig mover/pig hut/multi purpose… wooden thingy with wheels”

A cherry tree fell on one of the electric fences, and we ended up with some young piglets wandering around… but over all we escaped pretty damage free.  The ducks actually seemed to be enjoying themselves The goats, however seemed a little insecure I kept checking on them

They were cracking me up!  The chickens enjoyed some post hurricane foraging one wayward hen even ventured into the laundry room, but I wasn’t quick enough with the camera before the kids discovered her and shooed her out.

I feel lucky that we didn’t have that much damage and relatives lent us a generator so we were able to get laundry done and refill water jugs etc.  Honestly, my first thought after the power went off and I was getting breakfast ready was… coffee, how do we make coffee????