This first picture was Christine's parents home after we finished them.
This is our home after we finished.
As many of you know unless you are living off the grid or in a cave somewhere, Florida is currently experiencing a Catagory 4 Hurricane for the first time since 1992 when Hurricane Andrew came ashore.
So yesterday, in preparation for the storm, we got up at 7 AM and wisely got out our hurricane shutters and began to secure our home for the inevitable.
After 2 hours, we had the shutters up but realized we didn't give any thought to the new shed we installed about 6 months ago in the back yard. We built it and placed it on a concrete slab, but never secured it as it does weigh in nearly 600 lbs.
However as many of you may know, this doesn't mean anything to a Hurricane, so off to Lowes we went to get some hurricane anchors and secure this shed down into the concrete.
As we are at Lowes, we soon realize sheer panic has struck the Treasure Coast and one of the biggest items in demand is wing nut attachers that secure most of the hurricane panels to homes.
As everyone was looking all at the same time, social media soon lit up with many people looking for these highly demanded wing nuts, along with basic essentials of bread and water that soon left all the shelves in town.
As the store shelves quickly became bare, we saw God's grace kick in and Sam's Club was the first to respond to the need and dropped the membership requirements and invited to public to come and get everything they had, and boy did they. Batteries, water, bread, canned foods, all seemed to disappear.
Today, Bj's Wholesale Club and Costco followed suit and this was just an example of good neighbors taking care of neighbors.
Well, as these stories started spreading thru facebook and Nextdoor, the common item people kept asking for was wingnuts and while some wonderful people offered up their extras, it takes an average of 125 to 200 per house to put up shutters.
Well, we did ours Wedsnesday and didn't need any so we were okay. Or so we thought...
You see in Keller Williams, when our KW Family needs us, we are there to help so when our Admin had one of our clients offer her a home to evacuate to as she lives directly on the ocean, we thought how nice. The only issue was that we sold her this home only 3 months ago and while it has a complete set of hurricane shutters, it didn't have those dreaded wing nuts to put them up.
And since she was giving shelter to one of our own, the least we could do was to attempt the impossible and find these wing nuts to get her shutters up.
We scoured Social Media and all the stores to no avail. Finally, we found another KW agent in our office who found a friend from an apartment complex that could spare 125.
So with this news, we grabbed them and was ready to help get these shutters up for our Admin. Then came the phone call.
My wifes dad went to put up his shutters and again can't find his wing nuts. Now, I had a difficult decision to make as I just spent nearly 12 hours finding enough for 1 person not knowing I could do it again.
And while KW Family is very important, so is immediate family, so I gave it some thought and then came up with an idea. These panels are normally 3 bolts each and I figured if I skipped the middle bolts, I could stretch the 125 to maybe enough.
So off we ran to Okeechobee about 45 miles away first thing this morning with only about 6 hours until the winds start, we got her parents shutters up and used 75 of the necessary 125.
Then we darted back to Port St Lucie and started putting hers up at 12 pm with winds expected about 2 PM. We used the same technigue and got all windows done, but not the sliding glass doors which needed 11 more.
Knowing time was running out and so was energy by this point, we thought the only thing left to do was to run back to our own home and take some of ours and finish hers.
It was then, God shined his Grace and Love upon us as we were leaving the neighborhood, here comes another KW agent, Jillian Van Ohlen from our Stuart office and we stopped to see why each other were here in this 55+ community that neither live in. She said her grandmother just purchased a home in here and she and her husband were coming to put up her shutters.
We told her we were doing this for our client and Admin but ran out of wingnuts.
She said follow her to her grandmothers.
We get there and Grandmother has hundreds of these wingnuts as she said when she bought the home, she didn't have any either and figured she would get plenty in case anyone else needed them.
This is God placing an angel in your path when you need them most.
So we grabbed the 11 we needed and went back and finished our 3rd home of shutters.
This was a wonderful day of service and while we are tired and sore, our hearts are full of love and content and we know that tonight this storm will spare us as God knows that tomorrow as soon as this storm passes, I will be right back out there helping whoever needs me.
We were there for our KW family, and our own family, and our KW Family was there for us.
This is the most special part of working with Keller Williams is the powerful family we all become.
And our wonderful family is all about God, Family, then business in that order.
So to all of my KW Family, thank you for your concerns, and Barbara Johnson, thank you for trading batteries today as she needed D Cells and I had plenty and I needed C Cells and AA and she had plenty. Just family helping family.
Thank you Jillian Van Ohlen for your generousity, and especially thank you Maria Loder for generously allowing Holly to use your home and we have secured it with shutters and taken care of it while you are away.
If any of our KW Family need us tomorrow after the storm, you know how to reach us.
And if anyone suffers damage and financial loss, please let us know immediately and we can contact KW Cares and get you immediate financial help.
Stay Safe and stay indoors and hunker down.
God Bless Everyone and remember, cars, homes, and things can be replaced. YOU CAN'T!
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