Tornado preparedness, with a baby

I can't really post today without getting emotional. It's a sad day in Oklahoma as we watch our neighbors in Moore deal with the devastation from the very deadly tornado that hit. If you want to help, there are lots of ways--even if you aren't in Oklahoma.

• Money is always needed and disaster relief organizations could use your help. One of the easiest ways to help is to text "REDCROSS" to 90999 for a $10 donation to the Red Cross or "storm" to 80888 to donate $10 to the Salvation Army (you will then receive a free message that asks you to confirm your donation). The donation is then charged to your phone bill. Feed the Children is another non-profit organization, actually based in Oklahoma City, that accepts donations online.
• For those in or near Oklahoma City, Feed the Children has locations (29 N. McCormick and KOCO 5 News station) accepting donations of bottled water, sports drinks, diapers, canned food, boots, work gloves, and tools. The Salvation Army will be collecting donation at the KFOR-TV station.
• For those on campus, you can stop by the OSU Campus Life office Tuesday-Thursday to drop off personal care items (e.g., toothbrushes, baby diapers/wipes/formula, soap), batteries, hand sanitizer, and other necessities. Other companies in Stillwater are also arranging donation drives. For example, the 19th Hole has already loaded up a truck of supplies and taken them to Moore.

All evening I have struggled. I am so heartbroken and am also so very grateful for my family and friends who are safe. We are especially thankful for our precious little girl--who loves the wind as much as her momma. She doesn't yet know the damage the wind can cause.

So many of our friends and family get nervous when they see tornadoes in Oklahoma so I thought I would take a little time to talk about our preparedness. Around this time of year, I get a lot of texts and emails asking if we are safe or paying attention to the weather (and thank you so much! It means a lot that you care!). We are very "weather-aware" and don't take storms lightly. The one thing I think most people don't realize is that, out here, we get a lot of lead time before a tornado outbreak occurs. I knew last Thursday that we would be glued to the weather on Sunday and Monday. We typically even have a good idea of what time bad weather may hit, for example, I knew to watch the weather today between 1-5 pm and around 9 pm. I am very, very amazed with meteorology. While I sometimes complain about rain predictions, having the NWS in your state makes you pretty spoiled to good estimations for severe weather. Chad and I are pretty prepared for various scenarios. If we are both home, we would load up Alaina, the dogs, and our supplies (more about that below) to take to the university. If we are at work, Chad would pick up Alaina and I would pick up the dogs and we would meet back at OSU. My office is in a building that is a "shelter" so it's one of the safer places to be in Stillwater. It only takes about 8 minutes to get there so we generally have plenty of time. We would huddle (/have huddled) in the lower level/basement in an interior hallway.

Every spring, Chad and I have discussed having a storm shelter installed. People (including us) have been surprised to hear that most homes in Oklahoma don't have basements (clay soil/water line = bad combo for basements apparently). However, you can get a storm shelter installed fairly inexpensively. We have looked into getting one put in our garage. This is nice because that way you don't have to actually leave the house and you are less likely to have "critters" taking up residence in your shelter in the off season (I would imagine they are less likely to get leaks and such as well). The only downside is that you could be stuck under the rubble of a house. But that seems worth it to me. Now that we have Alaina, this seems like it may be more of a priority.

As part of our tornado preparations, I like to get things ready so that we can just grab our bags and get the family in the car in just a few minutes. This includes some water, granola bars, raisins, and other snacks, the iPad or laptop, our phones, and the chargers as well as the dogs' food and a couple of bones. I keep a spare kennel in my office closet that is big enough to fit Jasper and Madeline. I should note, we have been fairly well insulated from severe storms where we live so I tend to just take enough for us to spend an evening at the university. Most emergency kit tutorials suggest packing 72 hours worth of supplies. This year I created a mini-bag for Alaina as well.

We included:

• Water
• Sippy cup
• Snacks (baby goldfish and puffs)
• Diapers
• Wipes
• Easy squeezable pouch food
• Toys
• Bib
• Spare sleeper
• Blanket
• Wash cloth
• Baby tylenol and medicine dispenser
• Bottles for milk

I'll keep the bag packed for the remainder of tornado season and hopefully next year we can just store some supplies in our new shelter. If not, I'll rotate things to make it more developmentally appropriate.

Again, we are so thankful to be safe and are grateful for all the thoughts and prayers for us and for Oklahoma.