I'm in central Missouri and had about 7" of snow in the open areas of our yard from the storm on Wednesday. Our power flickered out twice but came right back on. I figured that once the storm was over, if we hadn't lost power, we'd be okay. I figured wrong.

I put our turkey in the oven set for 250o around 10 and went to bed. I was finishing feeding the goats, cats, Pyrs and sheep when my husband called out the back door that our power was off. My first thought was why he was telling me and not reporting it to the power company. We must be Information Central because two neighbors had called to see what our status was and if we had reported the outage. One neighbor couldn't figure out how to get her garage door open without electricity (DH told her to pull the rope hanging from it to release the motor from the cable--I'd forgotten that one).

DH did call the REA office repeatedly but couldn't get through. We set about thinking how to get the rest of our dinner ready. Fortunately, we didn't have a houseful of company so the meal wasn't so pressing. We are on a private well and if we have no electricity, we have no water. DH got out a 5 gallon container we keep for such emergencies and I used a big, though rusted, enamel dishpan, heated on our gas cook top, to wash the milking things and the breakfast dishes. The turkey was done beautifully but I normally use the micro to reheat the dressing I make the day before. I have a neat little solar cooker that I used despite the high overcast. We baked the rolls on the gas grill. I worked for ARKLA as a home economist years ago and one summer hauled that grill all over NE AR doing cooking demos--baking a pineapple upside down cake was one of my favorites so I knew it would work. The rolls didn't brown as evenly as in a conventional oven but they still tasted good.

The weather was fairly mild and we had adequate solar gain from our south and west facing windows to keep the living space warm through the day. We installed a woodstove in the other end of the house a few years ago and were prepared to move into that area over night if necessary.

Our next big concern was being sure the animals had water. DH installed "Lixit" water valves and put heat tape and insulation on all but they didn't work right then. I keep a trough full in the winter and dipped water from it to put in buckets for the buck and yearlings. The does and sheep drank from the trough.

We decided to run the generator to get the kitchen refrigerator cool after opening and closing it all day. Just as DH pulled it out to unplug it, the power came back on. HALLELUJAH.

I know this will seem tame to those who survived the awful ice storms in 2000 but it was an interesting exercise to test our preparations. In March of '98, DH had a business trip to Italy. The night after he left, the weatherman forecast "flurries". Well, we had 8" of flurries and because of the wind, a lot of drifts as much as 2' deep. The power went off around 3 a.m. and I reported it. I couldn't do anything productive at that point so went back to bed. Besides the temperature of the house was dropping quickly. At 5, I got a call from a man at the REA office asking if my power was back. It wasn't but he assured me the crews were working on it. At that time, the storm was still blowing full steam--snowing like crazy and a lot of wind. Not a night fit for man or beast but those crews, bless them, were out in it. When it was light enough to see, I went to feed the animals. While I was outside, the power came back on and I found a message from the REA man on the answering machine. Something to the effect of "if I can leave a message for you, you must have power back on." The thing of it was that I wasn't expecting DH back until the following Friday. This was only weeks after the big ice storm that left much of New England and SE Canada without power for weeks and I was worried. I had no electricity, no water, no heat or any way to cook. I had a barn full of baby goats, plus the other animals. I coudn't stay because of the lack of amenities but couldn't leave my animals had such a decision need to be made. And I wrote a thank you note addressed to the REA man on the phone, explaining my situation that night, but asked that he post it to the crews who had left their warm homes and beds to make me safe and more comfortable.

We had been in this house less than a year but you can rest assured we spent a lot of time and money upgrading the insulation, installing the wood stove and keeping a supply of wood cut for it, working out methods for protecting pipes, and providing for the animals in such a repeat.

What did you who were affected by the 2000 ice storms do that made things easier or wish you had done differently? I had a tub full of water plants that wouldn't survive in the open in the hoop house with a stock tank deicer in the water. The storm threw the GFI outlet on our transformer pole that I was using for electricity so on Wednesday night when our temps got down to 20o, the water partly froze. I don't think I lost anything but only time will tell. It was a heavy wet snow and I'm sure it's going to take some time for the evergreens in the yard to straighten themselves.