Sunday

It was an interesting day/night on Sunday,

I thought I might as well blog about it, but no pics this time, sorry!

LONG post, but read as you wish :)

I'll divide it into 3 parts for ya.

PART 1: MORNING CHURCH

Sunday morning was a very typical Sunday.

A very typical church service, in that we get hardly anything out of it

in between Aubrey...

-wanting candy

-slipping on the pew benches

-wanting on our lap

-needing to go potty or POOPIES

(saying it out loud)

-wanting books read to her out loud

-wanting in Daddy's spot

-wanting held "like a baby"

 -playing with her toy "friends" too loudly

-dropping her sucker on the floor 

(and Mommy wiping it off and eating it again...why not?!)...

and Avery...

-squawking

-drooling

-tooting

-eating her fist

-eating Aubrey's hand

-eating Steve's tie

-fussing...

Ugh,  I wonder sometimes why we really even go?!

Steve made the comment the other day, somewhat joking,

"Do I really have to take my whole family to church?!"

We said we really need a children's church DURING the service

for kiddos between the ages of 2-5.

BUT, in order for that to happen we would probably have to get

it going and  neither of us thought that sounded too appealing.

Okay, enough of the church service, then it was lunch and afternoon naps

and thankfully everyone had a good nap :)

PART 2: CARE CENTER SERVICE

At 4:00 we, along with two other couples from church

were in charge of leading a service at one of the Care Centers in Oskaloosa.

Steve, being the deacon, was asked to give a brief little message

that lasted about 5 minutes, which he did a really nice job on...

he spoke about our "freedom in Christ" - related to 4th of July, of course.

Way to go, Steve!

Well, then we are supposed to lead songs and all that, too, and I thouht

that we should have Aubrey do some singing! 

So, THAT morning, we practiced with Aubrey to see if she would do it!

So, the time came for her  to sing and I thought we'll see how she does!

She was super excited.

She got up there (with Mommy and Avery next to her)

ALL BY HERSELF

in a room full of at least 20 older people and sang 

BEAUTIFULLY and LOUDLY

(with a little dancing and skirt lifting...oops)

Jesus Loves Me and

The Lord's Army.

I SO wish I had thought to record it becuase she did so good!

She wasn't even scared and sang nice and loud.

Of course, the older people loved her!

I don't think many kids or adults would want to do that

by themselves, so I was very proud of her!

After a successful service at the Care Center

we rewarded ourselves with some ice cream from "Frosty Udder!"

PART 3: WEATHER

We decided to skip the evening service.

Evening came and Aubrey was in bed already and we were watching some TV

and noticed that there were some tornado warnings in northern Iowa.

Hmmm, didn't really even know storms were coming, although

it had been a very hot and humid day, so no surprise.

There wasn't a whole lot on TV so Steve and I turned it off

and were playing 

"Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader" on my iPad at around 9:15

when the SIRENS in town went off!

Wait, What!?! Sirens for us?!

We quickly turn on the TV and it says we are in a 

Tornado Warning until 9:45.

Well, it looks like it is going to stay north of Oskaloosa

so no need to wait up Aubrey and move everyone downstairs....yet!

We continue our iPad games and the sirens go off AGAIN!

Okay, now just a Severe Thunderstorm Warning, Good.

Let's get Avery to bed and we can follow shortly after :)

It sure was lighting a TON!

As we are looking at the radar a bit more closely, it is looking

like maybe these storms will hit us around 10:25. 

Maybe we should just stay awake until then to see once.

Sure enough, right at about 10:15 it gets 

really windy and raining, and thundering loudly, and hail for a bit.

All of a sudden a HUGE lightening bolt strikes and we lose power.

Great.

AND the sirens go off AGAIN!

Now we have no electronics to see what that was,

still a Tstorm warning or now a tornado warning?!

So Steve calls his parents at 10:30 at night (sorry!)

to see what we are under, they said now a 

TORNADO WARNING until 11:00!

Okay, now since we don't have any way of really following

the radar with no power, we quickly make the beds downstairs,

find the flashlights and grab the girls from their beds

and head downstairs.

Avery stayed sleeping in the transition which was great!

Aubrey was completely out of it - which was good too!

We all climbed into bed 

(I'm glad we always have beds set up downstairs for everyone,

especially for a time like this!)

since there was nothing else to do with no power.

About 15 minutes after being down there, we could hear the storm 

was weakening, good!

We decided to all just stay sleeping down there since we didn't have

the AC with no power and it was cooler down there anyway.

I figured I would wait until the power got back on, 

and then move back upstairs.

I think we all slept pretty well downstairs for a few hours

in the SAME ROOM

(with the exception of Aubrey falling out of her bed,

but we were prepared and had pillows set up...she doesn't

even remember doing it :))

and then the power came back on at 1:30.

So I moved back upstairs with Avery 

and Aubrey and Daddy stayed downstairs.

Phew, we made it!

We asked Aubrey how she ended up downstairs 

and if she remembers falling out of bed or anything

and she has NO IDEA!

She was very confused this morning - lol!

What. A. Day!

Unfortunately more bad weather this evening coming. :(