The schools let out early in anticipation of the high risk storms headed our way and I'm so glad! After watching the tornadoes in Cullman and Tuscaloosa form on the skycams and bare down on it's path of total destruction, I was glad my babies were home with me. My sister was with me too because we had some stronger storms and a small tornado come through earlier that morning and her work place had been damaged and she couldn't get to work, so she hung out with me all day. We sat and cried and prayed for the people of these cities as we watched the tornadoes swirling around with their massive debris balls (never had heard that term until that day) and I really believe our meteorologists were in total shock because of what they were able to see on their skycams. We had two tornado warnings where I live, but the storms were either to the north or south of us so we were ok, but the kids were ready.....just in case.
This picture is of some of the omnious clouds that went over us. Scary looking.
After the tornadoes hit and we started seeing the massive devestation, we knew we wanted to help in some way, but didn't know where to start. Our friend, Heather, has a friend whose family is from Hackleburg (one of the hardest hit small towns that basically was wiped off the map) and they were gathering donations to take up to the people that were left from the town. We decided to start gathering gently used clothes and water to donate and on the Sunday after the tornadoes, we were able to help take a caravan of people and donations up to Hackleburg.
We decided to take our two oldest children with us so that they could help because we really wanted them to see the impact of such a horrendous storm so that they would think about other little kids like them who had lost everything. They saw the tornadoes on the tv but they couldn't wrap their little minds around what it meant on the ground.
We got to the church and immediately started unloading all of the trucks and cars that had caravaned. Our friends, Chris and Lee and their son Christian, joined us. I was so proud of the kids. They jumped right in and started to help unload the trucks.
After we unloaded two big box trucks and then the personal cars and trucks, we headed inside and started sorting out all of the clothes. There were so many! It really overwhelmed me at how much people had donated in a short 3 day period. It made my heart proud of the people of our great state!
While we were unloading, sorting and organizing donations, there were a few people that had started making a big spaghetti dinner for the residents of Hackleburg. A few of our team loaded up in their trucks and headed into town to bring the people back to the church we had taken all of the donations to. They were stopped by state troopers and told that they were still finding body parts in people's backyards so they were not letting anyone into the actual city at that time. So the group came back to the church and waited. We waited around for a little bit and then decided to try again so this time we (David, me, Allison, Mimi & Bud and our friends, Chris, Lee & Christian) started driving to the city. We were stopped also by a state trooper but he told us that the power company was in there trying to fix the lines so we couldn't go in. I think he told us that just because the kids were in the car and he didn't want them to hear the truth. So we turned around and went back to the church. We waited a little bit longer and then decided to head back home. The group we went with stayed and were eventually able to get into the city. Here are a few pictures that my friend Heather took.
The above picture is of the schools. Just so sad!
Here are some of the pictures I took coming back from Hackleburg in other cities.
The above picture was someone's home. You can see where there is just a foundation.....no structure at all.
My puter or either Blogger has decided that I've blogged enough today. It isn't wanting to cooperate. I'll post some more pictures in another post.
Please don't forget to continue praying for and if at all possible, continue donating to all of the communities impacted by the terrible storms They are going to need long term help as well as short term.
Hope each of you are doing well!
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