Isabel
 
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Yes, we had a close encounter of the "Isabel" kind.  The beautiful, aprox. 300 year-old Silver Maple in our backyard decided it was its time, and Isabel decided it should come down on our house.  Even so, the universe was looking out for us because no was seriously hurt, and the damage to the house was not too extensive.

Our deck got flattened, and the mud-room off the kitchen was crushed.  The same main trunk of the tree that landed on the mud-room also smashed into the wall of Clay's room and the roof above .  He was asleep in the room at the time and had quite a rude awakening when the double window came out of the wall and smashed against his bunk bed, and the TV and DVD player under his window were turned into projectiles and hurled directly at him.  The DVD player gave him quite a knot on the head, but, miraculously that was the only injury he sustained.

The other survival story of the night was our dog Earl who was riding out the storm in the previously mentioned mud-room.  After tending to Clay, I went down to the kitchen and opened the door to the mud-room, only to be met with a scene of utter destruction.  I began to frantically call for Earl, who emerged without a scratch from under the crushed roof and three-foot wide tree trunk.

The next day we had a wonderful out-pouring of support from our neighbors, family and friends, who arrived bearing food, coffee, and chain saws.  We trimmed most of the tree and patched the holes in Clay's wall and roof.  Of course, we didn't have power for three days, but another generous neighbor loaned us a generator so at least our food in the refrigerator didn't spoil.  We were able to stay at my sister, Julie's place until the power came back on.

Here are some pictures and descriptions of Isabel's handiwork:

Here's the old tree with the kid's playset and the shed in the background.  It was about four feet across at the base.  The Old Tree
Here's the side of the house where the mud-room used to be.  In the upper right you can see the hole where Clay's window was and the pieces of tree sticking out of the roof about that.  That's our neighbor Todd starting up his chain saw in the foreground. North side 
Here's the deck with the tree laying across it.  Though this part doesn't look bad, the part against the house and off to the right of this picture were torn off the house and flattened.  Thank GOD the satellite dish was spared. Deck with Dish 
Here's what it looked like when we opened the door to Clay's room (though at the time the wind and rain were still howling in and we only had the light of a flashlight).  The windows were smashed and the window frame came to rest against his bunk bed (which probably saved his life).  You can see the back of the DVD player to the left which was hurled across the room and gave him a nasty bump on the head. Clay's Room 
Here's the outside of Clay's room.  You can see how it stripped siding of the wall and damaged the roof. Outside of Clay's Room 
Here's what it looked like when I opened the door from the kitchen into the mud-room.  You can see what's left of the roof rafters and the crushed tin roof near the bottom.  Earl, our dog, crawled out from under this without a scratch! Kitchen looking at Mud-room 
Here's the side of the mud-room where the tree hit.  You can just make out the edge of the kitchen door (from the photo above) left-of-center, above the tree. Crushed Mud-room 
Here's the other side of the mudroom.  The fact that this back wall didn't collapse is probably what saved Earl. Outside of Mud-room 
Here's the end of the deck where the major damage was done.  The house is to the right in this picture and you can see how the deck floor was ripped off the house and given a very hard-to-negotiate slope.  My gas bar-b-que grill was under there! Crushed Deck 


 

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