Well, seeing as my last post was quite a while ago how's about a quick catch up?
We'll start with the here and now. Thirty-seven weeks pregnant with Kenna Curran Palmer.
Kenna is Gaelic for fiery, beautiful, and a strong and competent woman.
Curran, as y'all know, is my maiden name. It also comes from the old Gaelic word corradh which means spear.
Let's rewind to January. We had days of snow and cold with a few beautiful days thrown in where we got outside and enjoyed the sunshine.
February rolled around and we got Tatum a fish tank for Valentine's Day (lots of time spent "playing" with her fish during snowy and cold days), celebrated Matt's 31st birthday, and instituted "family dates."
In March we got more snow, made molasses candy a la Laura Ingalls Wilder, did lots of indoor activities like making bird feeders and finger painting, and I finally got my coffee bar area set up. Mama needs her coffee.
And now we're finally to April. Tatum's first experience dyeing Easter eggs, choosing paint for the nursery and getting things ready for little Kenna to make her grand appearance. As of yesterday at 37 weeks, I have the green light to have this baby! Of course we're not ready yet so we're hoping she stays snug for at least another week or two!
And most of you know by now about this old/new thing I've discovered--essential oils. These have completely changed our family. I haven't gotten a prescription for my migraines since last March (as in 2013). I used them on Roy's tumor and saved ourselves a $500 vet bill. Every sniffle and bug that has crossed our paths has been dealt with at home--I didn't take Tatum to the doctor in 14 months and when I did it was a checkup and mostly to interview a new doctor for this upcoming baby. Bonus points for the doctor: when Tatum pulled out a roller of lavender to "play" with, the doctor said, "Oh that's the good stuff!"
Anyways, I've spent hundreds of hours doing research for classes I've been teaching since last summer, and am planning on a Google hangout sometime next week (April 21-26th) to do a basic class on oils. If you're interested drop me a line. I'm also going to try to record a class on YouTube, but I find it's easier to answer questions as we go along :-)
That's all for now. I'm always hesitant to share because I'm afraid people will think I'm selling something or hosting "parties," but I've seen so many lives drastically changed in this past year from these oils it feels selfish not to tell people about it. Cancer, thyroid problems, blood pressure, emotional trauma, kidney stones, asthma, allergies...you name it and "there's an oil for that." I've said that so many times the past year I think I need a bumper sticker. Or some self-control.
I'm sure there's an oil for that
UPDATE:
I had a number of you asking for the Intro Class on YouTube, so here it is! You'll have to excuse some temporary brain lapses--I do have preggo brain and I didn't finish it until 3 in the morning! If you're interested in the long outline with 3 pages of references I used in my research, drop me a line at TherapeiaLiving@gmail.com and I will send you the PDF.
First off, excuse the large pics overlapping the edges on the right, but I wanted to convey the sweeping feel of the destruction, and needed the larger size for that. Here is Part One and Part Two of this little series.
It had been five days since the tornado when my mom, Matt and I headed to Moore with Henderson Hills Baptist Church. We had our leather gloves and heavy boots, but we weren't really sure what to expect. Personally I wondered if we were really needed. The influx of volunteers had been so great, I couldn't imagine that twenty of us would really make any difference.
On the drive down in the bus we all chatted. But as we drove through the strip of land that had been decimated on both sides of the freeway, the bus fell silent.
Seeing it in person is different.
This was taken from what was the living room of a two-story house.
You can see down the stretch where the tornado ran, because nothing is left standing. Near the fringes, varying degrees of destruction showed on tarp-covered roofs and piles of mangled branches ripped from a tree and shoved into yards.
We parked at the CVS on SW 19th and Santa Fe where a large volunteer feeding station had been set up. As we ran to use the restroom in CVS before heading into the zone, the pharmacist saw us, ran out and stood to the side, nodding and thanking each one of us as we headed to the bathroom...before we had even done anything! The gratefulness touched my heart.
A few of the team members (including Matt) got a free tetanus shot from Walgreens across the street and then we began walking into the zone. We neared a house where a man was clearing out debris and asked if we could help. This house was on the outer edges of the main path. The roof was partially gone and damaged, and the backyard was filled with branches, fiberglass insulation, glass fragments, roofing shingles and wire.
Back and forth, from the backyard through the muddy red clay side yard and to the front yard we carried armfuls of debris and dumped them in an ever-growing pile. I pulled a twisted piece of metal thicker than my arm a foot and a half out of the soaked lawn where it had impaled itself.
Glass was everywhere. So many tiny fragments. How do you ever pick them all up from the grass? When can bare feet run here again?
My arms started to itch, and then my neck and chest. Fiberglass insulation was not just in cotton candy pieces on the ground, but in the air as well. Making its way into your pores, spreading with your sweat and driving you mad with itching.
We finished taking down the man's back fence, and as we toppled it over he said, "Well, we were going to replace this fence anyways."
Long stretches of wire had wound its way into trees and tied large bulk of debris together. Picking up armfuls of shingles, I found one shoe. A startlingly human reminder in the construction material cleanup we had been doing. Then I found a soaked teddy bear, his head cocked to the side as if to say, "Wha happened?!"
Matt went inside to help move out furniture and came back shaking his head. The rain had gotten everywhere inside, and everything was mildewed.
When that neighbor's backyard had been cleaned up, we did his two neighbors on either side. Carrying armfuls of debris no bigger than your hand. Sliding in the mud. Tossing it on the growing heap. When those three backyards were pretty well cleaned up, we moved on.
As we rounded the corner, we came upon the main path the tornado took. And it took our breath away. One man from our group just turned in circles with his hand over his heart.
Everything was just flattened. There were stumps of trees, and larger heaps where the homes had stood, but the overall look of everything was just smashed. Like a giant had decided to practice the polka there.
We headed down the street and broke into two groups--one searching through the wreck of one house for photos and a wedding ring, the other to help clear debris to get a truck out.
The white Dodge Ram truck only had 8,000 miles on it, and had been parked in the driveway of the house. So much debris had been shoved under it from the force that it was a couple of feet off the cement, and piled on top was the remains of a house. The front windshield was busted in, but amazingly while clearing debris the car alarm went off. When the door was finally clear, the owner got it...and started up the car! This gives a new level of meaning to their slogan "Guts. Glory. Ram."
Not only did the car start, but when a path over the debris was cleared, they hooked the back of it up to another truck, and the white Ram drove out.
One of the most shocking things to see was a pickup truck on its side, nearly wrapped around a tree trunk.
Want that closer?
Next we headed to a home that had been two stories. I worked in the area that was the downstairs bathroom as we dug for photos and jewelry. Thankfully we found a lot of photos--wedding pics, baby pics, graduations and birthdays, and some from the 1940's and 50's.
When I looked down this was what we were sifting through.
It was amazing we found anything at all! Sheetrock was so saturated from the rain that when you tried to lift pieces it just crumbled in your hands.
We pulled out unbroken framed pictures, books, cards, silverware, and some of her collection of bells and squirrel figurines.
While combing through I heard my mom exclaim, "OH!" I looked over and she said, "I think--I think it's...dead? OK, I can do this," and she reached in and grabbed...a wax squirrel. It was the weirdest, ugliest tchochke I'd ever seen, but it meant something to the owner of the house and we were glad we found it.
I also found a small revolver, and when I brought it to the sister of the owner who was working with us she shook her head and said, "Oh no--she wouldn't have anything like that in her house!" Wonder what house it came from...
After awhile working in that house, and lots of cheers for each time we pulled up a soggy photo, we headed out again.
The whole time, volunteers were continually driving by, offering water, hamburgers, snacks, baby wipes, and encouragement from the back of pickups or wagons they pulled around.
We pitched in at one more house where the chassis of a pickup truck was lodged firmly into the front of the house, and somehow a man who had been inside the house and trapped behind the truck was able to get out with no serious injuries.
Talking to a woman a couple of houses down, we found her son's best friend down the street had broken his pelvis and lost his mom.
As it was getting later in the day and getting warmer, most people we starting to head home. Here are a couple more snapshots from walking around.
Then we headed back, ate a hamburger and boarded the bus for home. Because of the horrendous traffic on the freeway, we took side streets miles from where we had worked, and the damage stretched all the way there, too.
When we first headed down I thought, "What's one little team going to do to really help? There are thousands of people volunteering every day?" After seeing some of the 1,200 homes destroyed and 12,000 damaged, I see that our team did help.
We helped the homeowners get their yard cleaned up a whole lot faster than if they had been by themselves.
We helped a lady recover photos that, a day or two more, would have disintegrated in the moisture.
We pulled out a toolbox for a man who had worked for GM for years, and when he retired they had it specially made for him.
What we did made a difference to those people.
And whatever contribution you make--be it monetarily, your time, your energy, food, or prayers--that makes a difference, too.
As we came up out of our storm shelter and sat down in front of the TV we began getting news.
One coworker's kids were at Briarwood Elementary...but she hadn't heard from them. She was at work with Matt watching the storm, not knowing if it hit her kids or her home.
Another coworker's boys were in the Warren Theater--they were OK but temporarily trapped.
A friend of ours was in a store with her husband and baby and taking cover in the freezer section...we hadn't heard from them.
Our good friends Jayson and Melissa found out their friend who is a teacher at Plaza Towers Elementary was okay, but trapped.
Neighbors were pulling neighbors from the rubble before first responders could get there. A house caught fire and burned to the ground--no vehicles could get through the debris to put it out.
A medical center was hit, and they had put the doctors in the walk-in freezer, knowing their skill would be needed when the storm passed. The rest of the staff and patients took refuge in the cafeteria--including a woman who was in labor and dilated to 9cm.
Moore Medical Center
The focus quickly turned to the two schools, and rescuing teachers and kids trapped there.
We watched in horror, not knowing what to do. There was an influx of help crowding the area, lines were miles long to drop off donations. All we could do was pray.
Plaza Towers Elementary School before and after
All kids at Briarwood were accounted for, and that coworker's home was only mud spattered, not damaged.
The Warren Theater had stood like a rock in the sea of destruction--everyone inside was uninjured and the building itself only sustained minimal damage.
Our friend and her husband and baby were okay, but the store they own was ruined.
The teacher was able to get out--with all her students. They had been in the hall, but apparently she didn't feel right about that and took them all into the bathroom.
We found out a coworker from Hobson's who is pregnant and due any day lost her home. A coworker from MACU lost his home as well.
In all, 1,200 homes were destroyed. Leveled. Gone.
And 12,000 homes were damaged.
This path continues for 17 miles.
Looking at the destruction, you could see this tornado was a "foundation sweeper." How anyone could have survived was a miracle.
Through the week, stories emerged.
A Vietnam vet and his wife who had a 12 person shelter opened it up and were able to get 22 people and 3 dogs in.
We knew of one woman who huddled in her bathtub with her kids, and they felt the tub lift from the floor, rotate, and set back down. Their tub was the only one left on their block.
People who were inside in-ground shelters could feel them rocking in the ground from the force of the wind.
Teachers who shielded their students with their own bodies as debris fell on top of them.
The man who is like a grandpa to his 6-year-old neighbor racing to the school to find him, and wearing an expression you hope you never have to.
When we went down to help with cleanup last Saturday, we talked to a woman who's pregnant daughter had been inside the house when it hit. They had been listening to the news and the tornado had been tracking more northeast. When the newscasters gave the cross streets it was at, she assumed it was heading north of her. She had been talking to her neighbor outside when they saw it at come to the end of their street. The storm turned and headed directly east. The neighbor ran inside and made it to his shelter moments before hit house was hit. The daughter ran to her house but only made it to the bottom of the stairwell. In the entire block, the only part of any house left standing was the one, white, unblemished door that was in front of the stairwell. Her boyfriend sped to help her, ignoring a police officer following him with flashing lights. He dug her out and she emerged with only a few scratches.
The neighbor said it took him 30 minutes to dig out of his shelter, it was so covered with rubble. And after a few hours it was entirely filled with water from broken water pipes. That was a reality we had never considered before.
You may have seen the video of the woman describing being in the storm with her dog, and while she made it OK, she didn't know where her dog was...only to have the news reporter spot the dog in the rubble.
Veterinarians were taking in animals and treating them for no cost, finding temporary housing for them until they could be reunited with their owners.
And there were the heartbreaking stories too. Twenty-four lives lost, including ten children. What was thought to have been the safest place at the school--the basement--turned out not to be. One man was running to his shelter, tripped and fell and hit his head--the tornado didn't even touch his home.
Looking at the destruction, however, it is amazing that the toll on life wasn't greater.
Another heartbreaking dimension was that the day after the storm another one blew in. Though not tornadic, this one dumped rain and hail on recovery efforts, and soaking belongings exposed to the sky. Stuffed animals, photos, clothing, everything was getting drenched.
On the Saturday after the storm, Matt, my mom and I donned our boots and gloves and headed down to help people sift through the rubble and recover anything salvageable. But you'll have to wait until tomorrow for that one.
To see the widespread amount of damage, Google released a map showing the path of the tornado. When you zoom in on the affected areas, you begin to get a sense of the devastation.
On Sunday, May 19th, we got to try out the storm shelter for the first time.
For you west coasters, let me give you a visual. It's a 3 foot wide, 4 1/2 foot deep and 7 foot long metal box that is cemented below our garage. We can drive our car in and still get into the shelter. The door slides closed with a loud metal clanging, and if we were to be down there during a tornado and there was debris on top of to door, we have an inside wench that should be able to get the door open.
This isn't ours, but it gives you an idea of what it looks like:
We decided to let anyone who lives her after us know who's house this was...we even got Roy and Tatum's marks in there...
We have been reassured by many that tornadoes usually go around Edmond. And really, they do seem to. Even when they do touch down, they are low on the destruction scale.
Tatum did fine as long as the shelter door was open, and she recovered quickly when we closed it because I brought out the iPhone. We even managed to get Roy down there, and once we were all down with interlocking knees he found it quite comfortable to lay down and take a nap.
While the tornado sirens wailed, we watched a funnel snaking its way to earth. It touched down a few miles from us, banged up a few homes, downed a bunch of trees, really did some damage on a new medical center that was due to open in July, and out into open country where it it turned into a multi-vortex tornado before dissipating.
The cross is Life Church...just up the road from Henderson Hills Baptist where my mom was hunkered down as the tornado went through the parking lot.
You can see an intercept of the tornado here:
Later a tornado touched down near Shawnee, destroying homes, turning over semis and killing two people.
"Tomorrow," quoth the weatherman, "has the potential for the same type of storms."
On Monday around 2 my family was one again at the house with the storm shelter open and ready. As a large cell near Newcastle seemed to appear from nothing, we heard tornado sirens again. Phones were beeping messages and warnings and the weather radio in our bedroom kept scaring the living daylights out of us with its super-loud warning.
We watched on TV as a low hanging wall cloud got lower and lower in Newcastle, until finally the funnel dropped down. By this time, my mom, Ammah, Roy and Tatum were in the shelter while Jeremiah and I scanned the clouds to see where this tornado report on my phone was coming from. It said it was less than half a mile away, and newscasters were obviously more absorbed with the EF-4 on the ground than anything that might be happening north.
We watched the live stream from a chopper as the tornado headed towards Moore, gaining strength, then would run outside and scan our own skies. We could hear the distant roar of what was becoming an EF-5 about 25 miles away. Then we would go back inside to see it was still there, big and black and grinding up the ground like a lawn mower. And our phone would beep and we'd head outside to look skyward again.
The air was heavy and muggy, the clouds swirling rapidly overhead in all directions. We ran back inside to see the tornado in Moore had hit one elementary school, and then another. Back outside.
So we did this for about 30 minutes. We brought out chalk for Tatum and crackers and tried to keep it light for her sake, but we knew every time we went inside that there was deadly destruction going on just half an hour to our south.
This is our skies, but no tornado...
Roy didn't like me not being in the pit with him...
Crackers keep this kid happy...
Tatum deciding to sit on Uncle J-J's artwork
When the sirens died away and we finally determined it must have been a false alarm, we headed inside and watched the tornado finally rope out and reveal the damage it had done.
It had been on the ground for 40 minutes and carved a muddy path for 17 miles.
Most of you have probably watched news coverage and seen videos and photos. Last Saturday we donned our work boots and headed down, and I have to say that nothing quite compares to seeing it in person.
But I'll post on that tomorrow.
Until then, hug your family tighter and hold your things looser.
This world is not our home, we're just a'passing through.
