Dodging Sandy

With Hurricane Sandy speeding toward Delaware, I spent most of yesterday reading weather forecasts online, watching them on TV, or doing both at the same time. I couldn't concentrate on anything but the 80 MPH winds, astronomical high tides, and 10 inches of rain we were supposed to get.

We saw photos and videos of roads in Sussex County buried in sand, waves crashing over boardwalks, and houses that looked like they were floating in the middle of lakes.

All I could think about was what might happen to the little cottage that we had worked so hard to fix up over the past three months.  We went to bed last night not knowing when we would be cleared to go down and check on it.

This morning, I checked online again and saw that Delaware's driving ban had been lifted.  Right before we left for the one-hour trip, I saw the following update on the status of our tiny community on the Delaware Bay:

Kitts Hummock lost lots of sand but there was no apparent damage to homes. The road into town was shut with flooding overnight, but is open now.

We drove down feeling pretty confident but still edgy.

As we got closer, we saw lots of standing water in the fields along the edge of the marshes but nothing catastrophic.  

We pulled into our driveway, and I grabbed the keys.  My hands shook as I unlocked the doorknob and the deadbolt.

It was perfect inside.  Not a drop of water on the floor anywhere.

We both almost collapsed with relief.  We had no plans to stay, so we quickly used the bathroom, and I took one picture that I forgot to take last time--I made a new curtain for the sink out of some blue homespun fabric that I had bought from someone at work:

I'm keeping the striped one I made first as a backup--we have no washer and dryer down there so I wanted an extra.

I still like the striped one, but I think I like the plaid one better--it looks more cottagey.  (The bare wall at the end is where the yet-to-built cabinet that we're still designing in our heads will go.)

I also forgot to post this picture of Doug's brilliant answer to a pot rack.  We definitely wanted one, but most of the ones you can buy are way too big for the space we have.  So Doug wandered around the kitchen store one day, just trolling for ideas, and he came up with this:

He bought a roasting rack for $11.99 and several hooks. (Of course, the hooks cost more than the rack.)  It's the perfect size for the assortment of pots we have and for the space we had to hang it.  You gotta love a guy who can solve problems just by perusing the shelves at the kitchen store--I'm just lucky he didn't come home with a new set of All-Clad.

For today, though, the pot rack and the sink curtain weren't really all that important.  All we cared about was that we still had a place to hang them.