It was a dark and stormy night...

Last Monday afternoon, party guests had said their good-byes, and we crashed.  I wasn't about to do one more bit of cleaning or cooking.  I sat at the computer and went through pictures, Ella played happily with her new Brave dolls and Scottish castle, James played with the old Disney castle and Prince Phillip, and I don't remember what KJ did, but it was relaxing, I'm sure.  We chilled.

Then right at the magic hour of eight o'clock when we were about to put the kids to bed, zwittt.  The power went out.  We stood there motionless, not sure what to do.  It wasn't raining yet, but the lightning was going non-stop.  There was a continuous flashing coming through the windows.  KJ grabbed his trusty headlamp, and I gathered candles by the light of his iPhone.  

 Ella was a bit nervous with everything so dark,

but she was quickly cheered by her brother.

James has turned into quite the silly boy and

quite the entertainer.

We couldn't quite decide on whether to wait a little while on the power before putting the kids to bed or not.  Both of our kids sleep with a fan on for white noise, and Ella uses a night light.  What to do... Meanwhile, I stood at our back door and caught a picture of the light show.

  James and an open flame...you know that's trouble.

KJ used the opportunity to record another video-chat with the kids.  It's become his favorite way to document.  They really are the best kids.  

In the end, Ella went to bed by candlelight, using the white noise app on my iPod (super useful).  James went to bed in the quiet (no candle for him!), and we slept by candlelight ourselves, and really, I quite liked it.  The power didn't come back on until 5:20 the next morning, at which point all the lights in our house did as well... We remembered to turn off the kids' lights but not our own.  James woke crying around 3 a.m., and after I got him settled back in bed, it was fun to look out and see candlelight flickering in my neighbor's house, too.