Hail!

We were awakened at 3:15am by the sound of hail. It was just starting out slowly as most hailstorms do, then suddenly, it was as if the sky opened up and dumped barrels of hail on us. We're no strangers to hailstorms, but this was unlike anything either of us had heard before. I started praying for God to protect our house, specifically our skylights. Steven got up to look out the window, and I headed to the kitchen to make sure we didn't have broken skylights with hail pouring into the house. (We didn't.)

I grabbed the camera and attempted to take pictures, but it was 3am, and there was NO WAY I was opening the door in that scary mess. Call me crazy, but getting beaned in the head by hail in the middle of the night isn't my idea of a good time. I was taking pictures through the glass panes of the back door and the storm door. This is the only picture that semi-turned out. Sorry for the poor picture quality, but those faint white circles you see... that's hail. It was big. The Weather Channel said it was quarter-sized, which is somewhat accurate. In diameter, yes. In circumference, no. It was like a quarter-sized sphere, which makes it bigger.



Neither of us could fall asleep again for at least an hour after that startling awakening.

Our yard and neighborhood look trashed today. All the leaves Steven raked out of the yard... fruitless effort based on how the yard looks today. Except this time, those leaves that will need to be raked are green instead of dead and brown. Our deck and back porch are covered in debris. Our crepe myrtles were just starting to get their spring leaves, and they've been beaten off.