Good riddence, Ike!!!!!!!

He was not a friendly visitor, that Ike. While he was only a Cat.2 (?) hurricane, he left a mark that will long be remembered. The winds roared ferociously, but thankfully we did not have the flooding that many Houstonians and Galveston residents and other surrounding areas are facing. We lost power for less than 24 hours, which was amazing in itself. Many are presently still without power and will be without it for so long. We just had a crew of six men from our church come and completely remove all the debris from the back yard.....well, everything except my tree in the roof of the kitchen! Yes, the top of a tree crashed thru the roof of my breakfast room. Some remodeling may be in my future! I must say that when fears reared, I was calmed by my Maker, and comforted with the fact that although a log came thru the roof, it was in a place that hurt no one, over tile flooring, and could not have happened with so little damage in any other area. So while it is a tiny bit inconvenient to have an OPEN air kitchen, it could have been so much worse. Since we were here, we were able to contain so much of the water that came through, and dump it out the front door, even in the midst of the hurricane. Since we were here, we were able to get all the trash laying on the floor out and it won't stink up the place by rotting there on the tile.....so I have LOT to be thankful for today! Here's a picture of our new skylight....ha. And all those boards we put up on the back of our house? They prevented broken glass that would have come flying in because when we finally got around to the back of the house the next morning, there was debris piled up against the back door and a large window next to the door, that we felt like would have ended up in the den if not for the trusty plywood! Thanks be to the Heavenly Father who protected us! So here's my kitchen. And for those of you who follow the Nester, and were part of her "POOPIE " party, I wanted you to know that while I really do despise fake ivy, I've found a type of faux-lidge I dislike even more!! This kind of faux-lidge is real, but much less desirable!