Yesterday was Devin’s 30th Birthday!!! Mother Nature wanted to celebrate the day big, and put on quite a wind storm in honor of his birthday. At around 2 am, the wind picked up and blew HARD for the next 12 hours, getting up to 83 mph around 8am. About 10 min away from where we live, the wind was up to 102 mph. The power was out for most of that time, schools were cancelled, work was cancelled and life was pretty much put on hold until the wind died down. It caused quite the destruction in our little town (and we even made it on national news)! Everyone around us (at least as far as I could tell) either had chunks of shingles blown off or trees blown down. It was crazy to watch the amount of shingles and debris flying through the air. I didn’t dare to stand outside for too long for fear of getting hit with something! My parents had a big blue spruce growing in their front yard and it had been there for probably 30ish years. An icon in my mind. Sadly, it blew down in the storm. I was really sad to see it go since it ha been there ever since I can remember. It was a beautiful tree. 
We were one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of people to have this happen. Driving down the main street and through the neighborhoods, it was sad to see so many beautiful trees blown down.
My in-laws had it bad as well. They lost a ton of their shingles and had a few trees in their yard fall down.
As soon as the wind slowed, it was time for cleanup. Dev took a chainsaw and went at it.
Even the boys helped out
Notice the fence in the background of this pic. A lot of fences ended up looking like this one by the time the storm was over:
The pile of branches. More piles to come!
This one was at Devin’s parent’s house: 
Devin’s mom hated to clean up the leaves from these huge trees. Guess that problem’s taken care of: 
The cool part about all of this is how everyone was so willing to help each other out! Neighbors came over ready to help get things cleaned up as soon as it was safe to be outside. A lot of the guys would go from one house to the next all day long (yesterday and today) doing what they could to help. It’s great to see such unselfish service!
I felt bad that Devin had to spend his 30th birthday cleaning up fallen trees, but he said it was cool to spend his birthday using a chainsaw all day. He’s such a man :)
6 comments:
Crazy! Oklahoma gets crazy winds like that in the spring and fall. They are scary!! Glad there wasn't any damage to the houses! HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEV!!!!
Happy Birthday, Devin!!!
The usual Casper winter wind must have shifted down to you while we got a bunch of snow...sorry about that. That's pretty crazy wind!
Glad everyone is okay and that it was only trees that went down, but even that is sad! It will be weird to drive in to town and see the makeover mother nature has given the neighborhood. And happy birthday Devin!
Holy smokes! I hope the house with the tree on it didn't have too much damage. Looks like quite the adventure. Glad to hear that everyone is ok. Hope Dev enjoyed his birthday!
I drove around yesterday to see the damage and I cried when I saw your tree! I'm such a baby...but I always loved that tree. It was amazing to see everyone come together and help:)
hoky smoky! that's some crazy damage. I can't imagine. There was a wicked wind storm up here in Alberta a little while ago- I don't think it knocked down such a beautiful tree like that but I know it took off shingles etc. oh and Happy Birthday to Devin!!
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