Learning and Growing: It was a dark and stormy night

Cars navigating through the high water on 162nd and 8th (we are on 157th and 10th) The Grange sign is the place of local neighborhood meetings.

Another shot in front of the Grange Hall.

And it really was, while this may be hard to believe the pictures tell it all.

The calm before the storm with a reflection of our lights in the window.

We were sitting quietly Saturday evening reviewing past family home evening lessons when several e-mail alerts came across the computer about severe thunderstorm warnings. The sky was a brilliant pink and orange. Because the area is so large we expected to see a little thunder and lightning, but what we got was much more. It nearly began with a brilliant flash and a boom that rattled the windows and chandelier. We heard a neighbor yell, "Whoooo!" The weatherman said that it was a storm moving at only 5 to 10 miles an hour. (unusual for the area.) Then at one point we nearly thought to take shelter in the center of the house for fear of tornado. The lightning danced all around us and the rain came down or rather blew sideways into the house, the trees looked sideways too. (That's the reason we thought we may be looking at a tornado.) Later, reviewing the Doppler showed that we had been in some serious weather. Flash flooding on several of our neighborhood streets (we are lucky enough to live on a slight incline.) At least two of our ward members received minor damage to their homes from the brunt of the storm.

It moved west but did not hold its severity and eventually became a nice rain storm.

The view from Orchards which is west from us.

The weatherman said that over 120 lightning strikes in that short hour and an inch of rain fell in the same hour. It was seriously frightful but fun. Enjoy the pictures.