Severe December Weather Forces Cancelation of Christmas Trip

December 20-25, 2022

An extraordinary "Polar Vortex" pushed very cold air into our area during the week before Christmas. We had never experienced anything like it. Knowing that colder air was coming for Christmas weekend, we planned to go to Pearl River on Tuesday to get there before it, but the alarming projections caused us to call off the trip. Concerns for protecting our plumbing, and concerns about being on the road in such extremes kept us at home.

Concerns about an old battery failing to start the car in extreme cold, we got a new battery. I found that the seals were gone in the inside cutoff valves to the outside faucets. I wrapped the outside faucets and left them dripping. I covered our four outside sprinkler heads with buckets of dry leaves, leaf piles, and tarps. Still, concerns about the danger of being on the road in such extremes convinced us to stay at home.

The weather kept getting colder during the week, with the lowest temperatures expected on Friday night, December 23-24.

We kept watching the weather reports as the "vortex" crossed Arkansas and gave Suzanne and Bobby temperatures about zero. It crossed into Georgia on Thursday night and the image at left showed the projected temperature drop during the night.

Friday night was even colder, with our temperature on Saturday morning reading 11° and the Weather Channel reporting 6° for Austell.

I think it got down to about 20° in Pearl River, Louisiana, which was more unusual than our 6° in Austell. Jeff and Darla had to take protective steps for their pump room and other parts of the property.

Christmas Eve Service at Mableton First

Since we were home on Christmas Eve for the first time in 23 years except for one Covid year, we were able to attend the Christmas Eve communion service at Mableton First Baptist. Rod sang with the choir as they did one of the anthems from the Christmas program "Majesty" that they did on December 18.

We have enjoyed having young Timothy Thomas as our Music Minister for the past six months or so, and our musical program a week ago was very well received. In this program his Mother Melanie did a wonderful job with "O Holy Night" with his father Joey accompanying her on guitar.
We were delighted to have several members of Timothy's family with us for the celebration. Besides his parents, two of his brothers and his Grandmother from Alabama and some friends were there.

They had set up a Christmas photo spot and Betsy Weaver talked us into posing there.

The entire service was very nice, and we had time to visit with each other before and after. The foyer of the church was buzzing with the different conversations and Christmas wishes.