tornado...

on thursday the small town just a few miles from our home was devastated by a tornado. 150 or so houses were destroyed or very damaged. luckily there was only 1 fatality. ricky was home with us as we had a doctors appointment in denver around noon with him. vera and ana were both at school. while we were at our appointment we had no idea what was really going on by our house. vera and ana ended up being in lockdown for 2 hours at school while we were far away in denver -clueless.
the kids were pretty scared by the end of it but they did really well. i was told that while in lockdown ana went around to the children who were crying and upset and tried to comfort them by holding their hands and telling them that everything would be okay. she is such a compassionate little girl. we were so proud of her. vera was very stoic as well. although her class had to spend an hour in the boys restroom because there are not many other rooms in the school that don't have windows.
by the end of the day we were all safe at home grateful that we were together and okay.

ricky and joe

this weekend ricky's cub scout troop was asked to go to our local outdoor mall and take a shift collecting donations for the tornado victims. they took in clothes, food, toys and over $400 in the hour they were there. they allowed all the cub scouts families to help as well. joe stayed with ricky and ana. our niece ireland and my brother chris helped also. i took vera and another girl to a different part of the mall to gather donations there. we wish we could do more but we hope that all the things we collected today will at least begin to help some people rebuild their lives.

vera waiting to get donations

collecting clothes and diapers

most all the scouts and their families

ireland holding a sign