We also went and played mini golf with the youth group, where we successfully beat the Erie kids!
Well you will have to excuse me for doing a blast of blogs in the last 24 hours, but I think I am nearly caught up! September for the Long family was particularly busy this year. August was spent either in the hospital, or recovering from the hospital, and even recovering from a cold at the end of the month. So September is a month we were very much looking forward to! Summer has always been my favorite season until this year...pregnant, sick, and huge did not make for the most amazing summer time activities haha. But it did make me think, what is it about summer I love? Well I love all of the warm activities (swimming, white water rafting, fishing etc..) but I no longer LOVE the 100 degree weather like I use to. So if I can have a second favorite season, it is definitely Fall! And although we were excited to get a jump start on all of the fun Fall activities, we spent a lot of September dealing with the flooding here (see previous post) and being slightly worried to go anywhere for fear that we would get cut off from making it home if the rain started again. But we did have some really great times too. For Labor Day we had a wonderful BBQ with Jeremy's side of the family so that everyone could come meet Lucas. Everybody just loves our baby boy! We also went and played mini golf with the youth group, where we successfully beat the Erie kids! So overall I think its safe to say we have started off Fall with a bang and are excited to see what fun October brings us =)
0 Comments
So for those of you not here witnessing this craziness, here is the story. Wednesday night (September 11th), after two days of rain nonstop, we were driving from Longmont to Boulder to help at youth group when we got an alert on our phones that we were in the middle of a flash flood warning. Honestly, I thought these flash floods only happened when a dam broke and that meant to get to higher ground immediately. My husband told me that even though my thought of a flash flood is correct, flash flood can also mean intense down pour that floods the streets, so basically proceed with caution. Well we went to youth group and decided it would probably be best to wait at the church for the rain to let up a bit anyways, but there was no luck. I have honestly have never seen so much rain at one time. You couldn't walk more than a couple of feet without being drenched, and if you were outside for more than 30 seconds you would literally be dripping wet. So we proceeded home and hoped the rain would let up soon cause we were all pretty sick of the dreary weather (note that before this we had been complaining of the extreme heat wave we had been in for weeks, and before that the state was on fire!) The rain just came and came and came...Jeremy left for work at 7am on Thursday and after an hour of being at work, felt that he really should head home. Thank God he did, he made it into town just as most of the roads started to flood, cutting off access to our side of town. By noon, the St Vrain River had flooded over into people's homes, causes tons of evacuations. Luckily we are on one of the highest points in the town and therefore stayed safe and dry. But not 2 mins from us neighborhoods are completely flooded. The devastation in this town is unreal. Half the town is still underwater with many basements, and main floors completely underwater. We are luckier than the town of Lyons and towns further up into the mountains. Many of the roads to the mountain towns are sunken in an unusable so residents are having to walk out of the town to buy groceries and supplies. The state is hoping to get those roads opened up by December! The people in Lyons have E. Coli in their water and cant return home for 6 months. There are so many people to pray for. Even though this flooding is devastating, there is a lot of good that has come from it. For starters, we have a ton of businesses in our state who travel around the US helping clean up after natural disasters strike, and those people have mentioned how amazed they are at our community. They said they have never seen neighbors being so generous, and looting is practically not even an issue here! Our church (Calvary Bible of Boulder) has been assembling teams of people to go into neighborhoods and volunteer helping clean up and rebuild, and on Wednesday, September 18th, we took groups of teenagers from our youth group into the neighborhood next to us to help the families there that were affected. It was so unbelievable and humbling to stand in the middle of all the debris, rocks brought in from the river, and piles of carpet, possessions, and dry wall stacked in the street. It was a complete privilege to not only help these families, but also watch our youth group work hard to serve our community. Below are a few pictures from the flood and our clean up process. One day a year millions of Americans log on to Facebook, Twitter, Blogging sites (like this one) and post pictures, songs, and memorials to the victims of 9/11 and the soldiers who went to war to fight for us....but it is only ONE day! People change their profile pictures to images of the twin towers, and American flags, but come the morning of September 12th, everyone goes back to their everyday lives. Why?? Is it maybe because we are all still so hurt and injured by the images of this day that we cant bare to see it for one more day? Is it because with our troops STILL fighting this war for us we feel anger not just towards the people responsible but also towards our own government for the decisions that have been made? Do we feel guilty for forgetting? guilty for ignoring? guilty for sending our troops?? What is it?? We all vowed 12 years ago to never forget...but have we forgotten? As I sit here on the anniversary, with my 6 week old son sleeping in my lap...I thing back to that awful day 12 years ago... I actually remember the night before better, I was crying in my room, and my mom came down to check on me. She asked me what was wrong and I remember telling her "I don't know, I just feel overwhelmed with sadness and the need to cry." Now as a 13 year old girl at the time, that prolly wasn't too weird of a statement but it was almost as if my body got hit with the extreme sadness of the approximately 3,000 Americans saying goodnight to their families for the last time. The Moms and Dads tucking their child in for the last time, the Husbands and Wives kissing each other goodnight for the last time, the pilots and crew members saying goodbye to their families before a flight, for the last time. Now dont get me wrong, I dont believe in having the ability to predict the future, nor do I honestly believe I knew what was coming. But I do know God gave me a bad gut feeling as if to be on my guard that night, and I was not surprised at all to wake up the next morning to my mother screaming at the TV. I remember waking in sheer terror as I heard my mother scream "NO! NO! NO! Oh My God NO!" I ran upstairs as fast as I possibly could and entered my Parent's room just in time to see the immediate replay of the second tower being hit. I had no idea what was going on, but mass chaos seemed to have broken out not only in New York but also in my parent's bedroom. I was grateful to find that my mother was seemingly ok, but I was completely puzzled by her reaction to what looked like a movie on the TV. I quickly realized however, that this was no fictional story, this was real life, and what I was watching on the TV was what thousands of Americans were living in that very moment. We were all late to school that day. I remember walking through the hallways of my Middle School and hearing the eerie sound of every single TV on in every single room. Besides the sound of the news, the hallways were dead silent. Every teacher and student glued to the TV with pale faces and tears in their eyes. We watched as the news came in about the Pentagon, and Flight 93. We watched as people jumped from the windows in desperation and fear. We watched people run frantically down the street as those towers collapsed one at a time, burying thousands of business men/women, service workers and people on the street. We watched as they pulled bodies out of the rubble and as people sobbed in the streets...these images still give me chills... The news was on all day, all night, and for days to come before people started saying they had to turn it off because they just could not handle watching the whole thing all over again. Is that when the forgetting started? Is that when the pain started to sink in and we all desperately wanted it to just be a bad movie? Did we all honestly believe that by turning off the TV, returning to work/school, and not talking about it, it would just make it all go away? Did we all become numb to the horrific images that day to protect ourselves from out right crying hysterically? Dont get me wrong, I do not believe it is or was healthy for anyone to be glued to their TV, obsessing about every detail of the tragedy, but I do think 12 years later we shouldn't be scared to talk about that day, what that day meant to us and our lives, and remember the victims, the firefighters, the EMTs, the doctors, the nurses, the surgeons, the police, the military, the government, and the good civilians who made heart wrenching decisions that day. Personally, I have been fortunate enough not to really be effected by this war. I say that because I did not lose someone I knew that day, I do not have family members at war, and I have the LUXURY of not having to worry about my safety on a daily basis because complete strangers have given their lives for me. But thats just it isnt it? We have forgotten that our freedom, our lifestyles, our education, etc....is all possible because of our soldiers who routinely say goodbye to their mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, children, friends...and risk their lives to protect us. Just because those responsible for 9/11, have been found and persecuted doesn't mean this nightmare is over. We forget the sacrifice American soldiers make every hour to keep us safe. We forget about the firefighters, police officers, and EMTs who without a second thought ran into those burning buildings and gave their lives to rescue complete strangers. We forget about the Doctors, Nurses, and Surgeons who worked long hours to care for those injured and dying. But it doesnt have to be that way...Dont let September 11th be a memory that reminds you to hold your family tight one day a year, let it be a memory that reminds you to hold your family tight every day! Let it remind you to Thank your firefighters, police officers, EMTs, and military and give them the respect they deserve. Let it remind you to donate to help military families, or to fund mental health programs for those with PTSD from war. Let this day remind you to Thank GOD for your family, your life, your freedoms, and to pray for those less fortunate...I CHOOSE to remember, do you? |
All about meHi my name is Ashley! I am a Christian, a wife, a mom and an RN. My husband, Jeremy, is the best, most supportive, and loving guy I could ever ask for. We have an adorable, fun loving, son named Lucas, a sweet, and cuddly daughter named Lydia, and a King Charles Cavalier named Tonks. Archives
March 2017
Categories |