Weekend wrap-up

First things first: I weighed myself before I left and had lost four pounds. So that means I'm only three months behind on my first-of-the-year goal of losing a pound a week. My daughter told me always to remember that slow and steady wins the race. Heh.

After a long weekend of travel and two parties and lots of family time, I'm quite sure those four pounds are back. I got to take one walk while I was gone, with my younger granddaughter, from my daughter's home to a park which is now under water.

You see, my friends, I went to Nashville for the weekend. Little did we know that not only would we be surprising my daughter on her 40th birthday, but Mother Nature would be surprising us with 15" of rain.

It began raining Friday night, late, and didn't stop until sometime Sunday afternoon. My daughter's neighborhood backs up to the Harpeth River, which quickly overflowed its banks. Homes across the street had lakes for back yards, and most of the major roads in and out of her town (a suburb south of Nashville) remain closed today. I didn't get to take any pictures of the flooding because I didn't want to risk taking my camera out in the rain.

Thankfully my daughter and her family are fine and, in fact, weren't ever in any danger. But so many parts of the Nashville area are devastated. Early on we were more concerned about tornadoes; I don't think even the weather forecasters thought the front would move quite so slowly.

Anyway, I made it home, as did the other out-of-town guests, although it took an hour to go the first four miles. There was really only one major road open and everyone who needed to get out of town was on it yesterday morning. My older grandchildren got yesterday off from school, but are back on schedule today.

I didn't get the fence up before I left, so that's definitely happening today. We had more than half an inch of rain here at home while I was gone, and I'm shocked at how much the grass has grown in just four days! Also, the hostas are thick and healthy-looking, the over-wintered parsley is huge and the asparagus is all feathery and pretty. Lots to do outside today, and I'd better get at it.