I’ve had a lot going on so bear with me because UFDA!
So last week we experienced the STORM OF THE CENTURY! Or at least of 2025. We were able to guess things were going to be serious when the morning sky looked like this:
Little did we guess the extremity of what was in store. The rain began while driving the kids to school in the morning on Wednesday, and continued coming in drenching downpours periodically throughout the day. It happened to be the night when Ruben had his winter musical concert. Now, normally Paul and Ruben leave the house around 4:15 to go have a quick bite at McD’s before heading to church, where Paul has to be at a catechist meeting at 5:30 before the 6pm start time for classes. However, what with Ruben’s concert starting at 4pm, things were a little different. He dropped Ruben off at school with Natalie accompanying him, and then I picked the two of them up afterward around 4:45. Since right at that time the rain was paused, they were able to walk the quarter mile to QT and meet me. I got them home, got Ruben ready to go and prepared to take him to church, via Taco Bell for some supper on the road. But by the time we got to Taco Bell, it had just started to rain. I sent them in thinking it would be ok – and it was while they were inside the store that it began to HARD. Like – sideways hard! And then it started to be SO loud inside the van that sure enough – it started to HAIL! It is VERY unusual to get hail in Arizona!!
The kids had to stay inside the store for about 20 minutes of that before it let up just enough to allow them to get only half-drenched running out to the van. I was just about to head for church when Paul called to say don’t bother, RE had been cancelled for that week. So, very relieved, I turned around and headed slowly back home. It was less than a mile, but we had to take it very slow as the rain and hail were crashing down again, and we were driving through lakes all the way. I was thankful to have such a high clearance, I would have been washed away in something smaller.
While I was carefully navigating through the lakes, Efrain called from home to inform me that our four trash bins, which had been set out for Thursday morning pickup, had been washed away in the rushing water! I told him to wait until the storm let up and then we could look for them, but if you listened to how loud the rain was in the video above, it’s no wonder that he misunderstood what I was saying and thought I said “Go look for them!” And Efrain, because he is a hero, put on his coat and went out into the storm to look for the bins. He was gone when we got back home – and when we pulled in to our driveway, the water from the street was halfway up our yard! He did find them eventually, but couldn’t get them back in the wind so he came home utterly drenched to tell me the tale. The trash had been completely washed away, no idea where any of it ended up either. We continued to marvel at the ferocity of the storm for hours. When it let up a little, he went out again and brought back as many of the bins as he could find. I think we are missing one! Even by Thursday afternoon, we still had a pile of hail-snow in our front yard…
The other event of the week that caused major disruption began after I’d returned from my morning drive Thursday and was sitting at my desk, about to work on editing some photos Natalie had brought home from a night of Matador basketball (2,741 photos… ai-yi-yi girl!), when Laurent walked in cheerfully bearing paint rollers and brushes. I had completely forgotten that we’d planned to repaint our tiny bedroom on this day, since she was taking Thurs-Fri off of work and could help!
Out the window went my editing plans, and we made an agenda for the day. I still had to run back to school again, as Ruben had a follow-up telehealth appointment about his sleep study (he’s fine, no sleep apnea thankfully), and then I had to get him back to school. So Laurent headed off to Lowes and bought the paint while Jacob came with me to drop off Ruben and walk him into the building.
Back at home, the great removal began – all the shelves and clothing in the closet had to come out of the room, and the beds got pushed into the middle and covered with tarp. Then there was the wall washing. Then there was some sanding on the spots where paint had been peeled off (why do children do this??). Then there was taping, and finally came the painting. Jacob was able to help with the high stuff while Laurent did the edging and the lower parts. They made a pretty good team. But boy, howdy – it was a long day of work! Thursday they managed to get the priming done, then two coats of the main color on walls, ceiling, and in the closet, waiting for each coat to dry in between. Laurent decided to start Jacob on watching Resident Alien during the drying spells – such a funny show. There was more painting to be done on Friday – taping off the color block section and painting that twice or was it three times… but anyway, here is the process as of end of Thursday:
As you can tell, it’s a very small room – our two twins barely fit with only 36 inches to spare. I’d rather have a queen size, but because I absolutely have to have the bendy-bed for my back, it’s basically a king size – in the smallest room in the house.
The job did get finished, and we were able to get most everything back into place by the end of the weekend.
I have to mention Friday morning though – Thursday had been very dark and moody, but not much in the way of precipitation. By Friday, I came out of the house in the morning around 7am to the most spectacular sunrise ever! And then as I was returning from my morning drive, there was a great commotion two houses up the street from us. Our neighbor has had a very dead, very enormous pine tree in the front yard for many months. I think the severity of the wind in our storm of last week prompted him to bring in the removal experts, and they were up the tree cutting off the branches in preparation to take it down. I’m so grateful that is done now, as it could have caused terrible damage had it fallen!
The weekend was relatively calm – nothing going on except driving Natalie and her bestie to and from another friend’s Quinceañera, going to Grandma’s on Sunday,
and continuing to put the room back together a little bit. I want to show off the final result of all that wonderful labor, but I have a couple of furniture items I’m waiting to get, and some decorative touches to install, and then I will post about that.
Last but not least, Monday came around, and I took Jacob around 9am to a place that assists with employment training and placement for people with disabilities. I’ve called several times to try to find out more about how they can help, but can never get through to a person, either by phone or email, and nobody calls me back. So I thought, why not just go there and see what is what? So when we got there, we discovered there was no entry to the parking lot from the main road. I drove around the side of the building and into what I thought was the parking lot entrance, and this is what greeted me:
Yeah, that’s right, completely blocked off. Their hours were supposed to be from 7:30am to 5pm. There were cars parked beyond the chain, so they were apparently open and people were on the premises. They even had a handicapped parking spot up by the front. It was empty. But could I get to it? No. I couldn’t even see a way to park outside the chain and get through with my wheelchair! The organization that is supposed to help people with disabilities was completely inaccessible. Good grief! So that plan was a bust… I’ll have to keep looking because I know there must be a place that can help us out.
And finally, Monday was the 19th birthday of our lovely and gracious Natalie. She is as effervescent, opinionated, compassionate and confident as she is beautiful – a force of nature, for which the world is not ready. Nonetheless, she is coming, so prepare yourselves. Just a few short months and she will graduate and be released into the wild!
Happy Birthday to our Precious Princess!!
