"Mommy, why did the tornado hurt our house?"

The question of an almost three year old.

Many of you have messaged to ask how Katherine is doing. So I thought I'd write about it.

For the last month or so she's been calling our house "the family house". We aren't sure where it came from or why she started it but its stuck. Now all three of us say it. Explaining to K what a tornado is has been challenging. Explaining to her that the tornado hurt "the family house"... also difficult.

"Mommy, the family house is hurt?" (Trying to explain why the blue tarps are all over the house I said that they were kind of like band-aids for our house until we can get it's boo-boos fixed.)

"The leprechauns made a mess!!" (On St Patricks Day the "leprechauns" came through her classroom at school and messed up some of the toys while the kids were playing outside. Since then the kids in her class insist that when there's a mess the mischevious leprechauns must have done it.) Today she told us she loves the leprechauns. (She also loves the Easter Bunny she said.)

"Mommy, noooo we can't go to the family house!! There is glass all over your bed!!" (After telling her that we weren't going to the hotel anymore. We were going to go back to our house. I'm wondering if this also had something to do with having fruit loops for breakfast every day and went swimming in the hotel pool. At home she gets a banana or some other kind of fruit for breakfast... Not sugar-y goodness cereal.)

"YAYYYYY Mommy my room is all cleaned up!!!" (On Saturday when we got home after the tornado the only room I could reasonably say was safe for her to be in was her bedroom. Needless to say the carpet needing vacuuming after trekking straight to that room on Saturday. She was quite excited that her carpet was clean. Thank you Veronica!!!)

We continue to try to explain what happened and realize she sees and hears what people are saying. She knows she can't go outside to play because there is glass and trash in our yard. (Trash is easier to understand than debris.)

She wants to know if her playset can get a bandaid and get better. Unfortunately, unless we can get the yard cleaned up really well, I don't know that she'll be out there playing anytime soon. We were talking to our neighbor about how to clean up the yard. He had a great idea. We're going to use our shop vac & leaf blower vacuum to try to suck up some of the stuff. Then in the fall we may try to put down a layer of topsoil over the grass to help with the debris clean up, rather than just wait for it to work its way into the soil. Cover the yard just enough to see the top of the grass so it can continue to grow and hopefully make it safe for Katherine come spring of next year.

The first couple of days were rough. Since Wednesday each day we've see a little progress.

Wednesday evening we had a bit of a party night. Pizza for dinner, followed by ice cream and then swimming in the hotel pool. She was pretty excited. I was pretty dern cold! ;)

Thursday she had her party at school for Easter, complete with Easter egg hunt & visit by the Easter Bunny. At this point, I have no idea how many times she's been to see the Bunny this year. ;) Thursday after the party we went back to our house. My cousin Michelle and our friend Veronica spent Thursday at our house helping us clean it in preparation for us coming back home. (Thanks again ladies!!!) She was a little hesitant to come back home but once she got inside she was pretty happy. It looked back to normal for her, aside from seeing the blue tarps on the windows. But she knew they were bandaids for the booboos.

Today we went to the beach and had a visit from the bunny while she and I were at the potty ;). He left us some Easter eggs on our blanket, in her toys and on her chair. When she saw it, as we were coming back, she took off down the beach to go see them. Excited is an understatement. Tonight we started to make an Easter Bunny cake. She wanted a cake and when I asked what kind she said a bunny one... So we're making a bunny cake. We had a pajama party tonight. (Jammies for the whole family & watch a movie).

While we were eating dinner tonight we had another conversation about what happened. She knows when we go home in two nights we'll be going back to the family house. She seemed a little better about things tonight. In fact, it was the first night since the tornado (outside of Saturday night when she was sleeping with friends in the same room as she was) that she didn't cry for me to sleep with her. She's still sleeping with my shirt, but she went right to sleep tonight. Progress.

So... All in all she's doing okay. Again, I'm very grateful she wasn't in the house during the tornado. She remembers nearly everything, even things that happened months and months ago. She mentioned last week that Elmo sprayed water on her... It was the 3D show at Busch Gardens. In December. She remembers.

Tonight the Easter Bunny came. I'm sure tomorrow she'll be jacked up on sugar. And I'll be perfectly okay with it. ;)

Happy Easter everyone!! xo
Darlene, Stephen and Katherine