We got a huge stoke of LUCK. Ike was good to us...no damage ....electricity restored after only 10 hours of outage. There was a good breeze so we opened the front and back doors and windows and cooled off.

Lori and Greg were not as lucky. Lori has 6 pine trees down in her back yard and 3 down in the front yard. Her husband Vic did a great job of parking the 2 trucks, 1 car, 1 horse trailer and the tractor and they lost none of those. They are staying with us as they do not have power or water. Greg lives only 1/2 mile away and he has no power as of Monday. He and his family are staying with his wife's family but visit daily.

I guess we should have bought a bigger house. Who knew !

Today Bill has an appointment at 1:30 with his first therapist. It is occupational therapy. We are anxsiously awaiting the physical therapist phone call to get that started again. We have some ground to reclaim. The left leg and foot are getting weak.

He had a really good day yesterday. He was up in the wheelchair all day. He transferred three or four times. He sat in a chair in the den for about 2 hours which is a first. He stood by the kitchen sink a couple of times to bear weight on the legs.

One of the therapist from New Orleans had suggested that....I was afraid to try it alone. But it is fairly easy with two people. We roll the wheelchair up...lock it....Bill puts his hands on the sink and comes to standing with one of us on either side to help...it is moderate help at this point. When he is tired he just sits down to take a rest and we start over again.

But we are ready for some walking on the walker type stuff. I can't hold him up for that by myself and think we need the pros for that awhile longer.

I will keep you posted>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Holy Crap....................
Everybody is asleep in the house but the wind is really blowing hard. It is especially loud in our master bathroom due to the vent. I can't say that I have heard any damage. But the winds are now sustained pretty strong and gust are really hard.
So far no rain at all it's 11:30 PM on Friday. Ike is knocking at the door. We are not answering. We still have power at our house. The new reported 315,000 customers are without power as of 10:00PM.
Lori, Maggie, Vickie, Bill and I are riding it out in our new house in Cypress, Texas.
Vic Lori's husband, daughters Abby and Shelby are riding it out in Magnolia as Vic needed to be there for the horses. They live in Magnolia, Texas in a wooded area, they lost power about 9:00PM.
Greg lives in Houston but only 1/2 mile from our house. Greg, wife Tina, daughters Macy & Marley are riding it out at their house. But lost power around 10:30PM.

Bill's blood pressure has been up today. I think the storm coverage has him worried so we have not had it on today for him to watch at all.

Bye for now.....................your hunkered down, holting tight friends in Texas !

Damn I hate roller coasters !!

Well we are home. In our new house getting somewhat settled and mostly unpacked. Bill has a electric hospital bed. He has a new primary care doctor that we have already visited just to meet her. Dr. Amy Foster right here in Cypress about 15 minutes away. She was great and very through. She got him a chest -ray and blood work right in her office. All test are good except his coumadin level needed to be raised slightly.

Bill is feeling well and adjusting well to the change. He says the food here is much better. HaHa
Today he got the Shrimp Dianne he has been asking to have for months. He got it the hard way.........since Ike is probably going to knock out the power. I didn't want shrimp in the freezer. Luckily I have not even plugged the deep freeze in nor have I had time to grocery shop or cook.

I will say it is harder than I originally expected. Bill is max assist most days but we are working well together and I am able to get him out of the bed and into the wheel chair a few times a day. We started this week with a lady to come in to bathe him 3 times a week. But are still waiting to get the physical, occupational, & speech therapy started at home. I guess we are waiting for the new insurance to get up to speed on Bill's needs. They sent a nurse to our home to do an assessment of his medical history and abilities. She said it should not be a problem and he should qualify. We just waiting and all the while Bill's legs are getting weaker. It is hard for me to do weight bearing with him by myself. I also think I am afraid we could get into a dangerous situation without help. So I have elected to wait.....

We are staying home for Ike. Several people have told me that we are in a no flood area. So it is just the wind and tornado we need to fear. Last night Greg came over to help me move boxes to one side of the garage so he put our car inside of the garage. This is the first time in our lives we have ever had a garage we could park a car inside. Tonight Greg is coming back to help me pick up patio and porch furniture and bring those things inside. Tomorrow Lori and her girls are coming over to stay with us until the storm danger has passed just in case we have any problems we won't be here alone. Also, I had not met any of our neighbors but today two couples came over to give us their phone numbers and tell us we will not be here alone as they are staying also. That was very nice and made be feel more at ease with the decision to stay.

Now that we have our Internet hooked up at home I will get the updates more frequent if we don't loose power. Till then ................your friends on the roller coaster continue the ride.

Love Ya Ruby