Wind...

The wind here is truly amazing sometimes. I have never experienced it anywhere else I've lived or visited. It's partly our 19-year-old-windows, but mostly our location with the open space and Standley Lake right behind us. The wind gusts howled last night enough to bring 2 kids into bed with us. Once it wakes me up, it's incredibly hard to get back to sleep. Then my mind starts running! Sometimes I swear that the entire house is moving, shaking, the sound is so scary. We have a basketball hoop in the backyard, the portable kind with water in the base - we have to set it on it's side every night for fear the wind would cause it to crash through the window.

This weekend, we finally cut down (well, had someone cut down) the last of our big tree in the backyard. A victim of the wind! So many times, a wind storm would cause huge branches to break off this tree into the street or backyard - often so large it would block traffic - and Jason would break out the chainsaw and get to work. It looks so odd now, with the tree gone, to look into the corner and see straight out into the open space. It's sad for a tree to die...sadder still the money spent to have it removed!