Stormy

A very stormy day at Rialto Beach.  James Island in the background.

And the tree came tumbling down...

I've used this Chinese Coins tree as a frame for pictures, and as a subject in and of itself.  The birds used it as a lookout, and as a refuge or resting place.  It was glowing yellow in bloom, and sparkling when frosted. 

The winds took it down last week. 

It hadn't been healthy since a storm last year almost ripped a limb completely off;

and, we knew it was only a matter of time, even with our efforts to shore it up.

Still, it was sad to see it go.

Here, my husband has already been cutting the branches off,  though you can still see the break.

We heard it go down, although we didn't know it at the time. 

After hearing a crash one night during the howling of the storm, we went outside to see if there was damage.  It was dark and still raining. What we could see didn't show damage to the house, the vehicles, so, we went back in.  The next day, in daylight, we noticed. 

Our view is lessened by its demise.

Now we are asking ourselves, "What should we put up in its place?"

Stormy sunrise

Sun just clearing the hill at sunrise

Forks skies

These are the Forks skies we like so much.

The Twilight fans might even call them Vampire skies. [grin]

There's a storm a comin'

Well, there was at the time. This is from a couple of weeks ago - the day changed from blue skies to dark gray clouds. It just depended on which direction you were looking.

blue skies between storms - Sky Watch Friday

Sky Watch Friday

For more Sky Watch Friday, go to:

http://skyley.blogspot.com/

Before the wind...

..there was snow that had covered everything. (This was early in the storm.) By the time the winds had blown through, this bench was clear again. I'll post more pictures the next few days.

Two weather faces today

Mowing the field across the way, this morning before the storm hit, with a very happy dog chasing whatever caught his eye.








The evening sky with rain and storm. You can't see the winds blowing, but it is a good storm.

Nice.

Before and during storm

Main Street Holiday Decorations - Friday, when skies were blue, and Saturday morning, at the beginning of our first snow storm of the season. We had gotten several inches by evening, along with hail, and are forecast for about 20 hours straight of rain, giving 6-8 inches of rain on top of the snow melting. The rivers are going to be running deep. "IIIII'm dreaming of a Whiiiiiite Christmas..."
[I refused to put any Christmas decorations up before Dec. 1, either at the house, or on the website. Now that it's December...]
I'm sorry for not posting for a couple of days, and it might be a little sporadic until I get situated enough to not exacerbate my newly-diagnosed carpal tunnel. We think it was doing the website with my laptop actually on my lap in the evening.

Stormy and dark day

This is the parking lot/wading pool of Forks Outfitters/Thriftway, with a truck water-skiing its way to a parking space.
Today was the third (fourth? fifth?) straight day of stormy weather here. This piece of the storm, with high winds and driving rain, put out the electrical power for a little over 12 hours here today. I'm not sure how widespread the outage was, though it was the Forks area. It started about 4:30 this morning, and our power came back on at 5:20 this evening. I think all of Forks is back now. The stormy season has BEGUN!
When we have power outages, which are not rare, it is usually the whole town, which includes the main street of businesses. The only ones who do business have a generator. The grocery store in town, Thriftway (which is also Outfitters Clothing and Ace Hardware), has a generator that gives it the ability to sell, but it also has an espresso stand that gets especially busy on these days.
The only restaurant that is open during outages is the hospital coffee shop - which feeds a lot of people on outage days, I'm told. As we drove around today, looking around, we spotted one of the local espresso stands open as well.
Most cooking is done with electricity here - very few people use anything else. There are no gas lines, and propane is available, but electricity is fairly inexpensive here (compared to other parts of the country we have lived in). Most houses are all electric here, I believe, though quite a few of us use wood for at least partial house heat.
We use the fireplace insert to warm the house, so we stayed toasty warm as long as we stayed inside. Going out meant getting soaked in a matter of moments.

This is the entrance and espresso stand at Thriftway (through a rainy windshield). During a power outage, lights and a neon OPEN sign can be very warming!