State of Emergency, Frankenstorm, and Our House in Autumn: Weekend Window

Our woods chopping wood late autumn — Getting ready to finish stocking the woodshed. Late autumn at our home in western Pennsylvania, 2012.

As we work hard to remove leaves and prepare our house for this potentially”once in a lifetime” Frankenstorm, a convergence of Hurricane Sandy from the east, and an arctic storm from the west, Pennsylvania has preemptively declared a state of emergency to prepare for power outages that may last a week or more.

We came home for the weekend to give the house-sitters a break and stock them with firewood, clear leaves and clean up any areas that might be a problem when the storms hit Monday night. We have a lot of seasoned logs about, to move to the woodshed area and chop, and we have a lot of downed trees and logs to chainsaw and put in a staging area. The woodshed will hopefully be well-stocked by the time we’re through.

I thought you would enjoy a little look at our house as it appears each autumn. When you live in the woods, trees are always a danger. Many people clear trees within a certain distance of their home, which makes it far less likely that they might have a family of squirrels suddenly catapulted into their living room, along with the oak they were living in.

pink hydrangea bush late autumn PA snowball bush — Our hydrangea bush is mostly finished but a few pinked snowballs remain, sharply pretty in contrast to the brown and green of late autumn.

In fact, my in-laws had that exact scenario (sans squirrels) with a large poplar tree as they were sitting to dinner on year. It practically split their home in two.

We’ve considered it, but we try to just be conscientious of the health of the trees, the age of the trees, and hope we’re good enough tree stewards to take the weak ones down to reduce the chances. Because we like to live in the woods…not in a clearing.

That said, I take a lot of photos, especially before winter storms, because you never know.

If you live in the northeast, or anywhere bracing for a storm right now, I hope you’re stocked up and have an emergency plan for your family.

western Pennsylvania fall foliage — One of my favorite pictures of our house from Autumn 2010. It’s tough living away and having other people live in our house, but it’s better than sitting empty.

As I’m making arrangements and prepping the house, Kurt is spending his second day off working out scenarios to prepare for at the power plant job he’s on now.

Are you a planner for regular storms, for “Frankenstorms” or worst-case scenarios? What do you do? I’d love to hear your tips and thoughts if this is going to be “the storm of a lifetime”?

Love, Sasquatch

Our house in late autumn — Our woods in late autumn

grapevine wreath braided small PA — As we work on the property during the summer, we often pick up and braid grapevine leaves to give as holiday gifts or just hang around the property, like this one.

Pennsylvania house late autumn leaves — Cleaning leaves off our long gravel driveway is ongoing, but pretty in between clearings!

Pennsylvania house gravel driveway leaves late autumn — A leaf blower is the best way to keep our long gravel driveway clear in late autumn. Removing the leaves before rain or snow is critical to keeping the driveway from getting slick.

Donald Leroy Sink wood carving eagle bird spread wings — Wherethefakawe bird was carved by my dad in the late 60s or early 70s. I can’t remember any time in my life when it didn’t hang on one of our houses. It now hangs on our home, thanks to my generous brother who got it back from a relative and fixed it up to give to me.

Our red Japanese maple in the meadow below the house, late autumn, 2012

cleaning leaves from springhouse Pennsylvania woods — Cleaning leaves and debris from around the springhouse is another ongoing bit of work at our home in the Pennsylvania woods.

6 thoughts on “State of Emergency, Frankenstorm, and Our House in Autumn: Weekend Window”

yourebberlubbinbrudder says:

29 October 2012 at 09:08

Yea, kinda funny. If you had seen my lovely wife these last couple days, it’s like watching an episode of “doomsday preppers”! You know me, I got wood, I got water, I’m good.
Nice to see you included pic of “wherethef*kawee” bird. (Still think it should be travelingmarla mascot!
trophos says:

28 October 2012 at 21:18

Your house and land are beautiful! I should be more worked up than I am, since Phila is supposed to get hit pretty hard, but I figure there’s really nothing I can do. I got groceries, and the husband squirreled away a lot of water, so… now we wait! At least school was closed, so I get a couple of extra days off 😉
1. travelingmarla says:
  
  28 October 2012 at 21:33
  
  Thanks. It’s hard to be away from them so much. We live very cheaply when we’re moving around for my husband’s work, so it really makes me appreciate having it all the more. The place we’re renting in Ohio is cheap in every sense of the word, so it makes me really miss home.
  I hope you are safe there. Yeah I also heard Phila will get walloped. Frankengeddon. 😉
Nafees says:

27 October 2012 at 22:42

wow 🙂
humanTriumphant says:

27 October 2012 at 18:57

lovely – thanks for sharing. hope your planning’s all for nought.
1. travelingmarla says:
  
  28 October 2012 at 17:16
  
  Thanks. Me too!

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MarLa Sink Druzgal

Freelance Creative Professional