Beneath Hannah's swinging feet lay bricks and shattered boards mingled with the books, shoes, clothing and games her family had kept in their basement.

A hand emerged from beneath the house, and in it a bright red purse. The hand belonged to Hannah's father, Doug; the purse was her mother's.

"This will come in handy," Doug Coates said, ducking out from beneath the house.

Coates explained how his family had been in the basement, but right before the tornado hit, they had gone into what used to be a food cellar "just to be safe."

"It's a good thing we did," he said, motioning to the debris-ridden basement. "We kept hearing this banging sound. I think it must've been these beams breaking."

As Doug Coates sifted through his family's possessions, Hannah stared from where she sat into what used to be her bedroom. The room, painted a cheerful shade of yellow and decorated with stenciled butterflies, was mostly intact, but her bed was mangled.

"They used to be bunk beds, and they used to be on the other side of the room," Hannah said, her young face showing no emotion.

 A car-lined street called to mind a scene from a demolition derby. Trees - all the trees - were snapped off at the top of the trunks, leaving an eerie absence of a budding canopy. Shrubs and bushes stripped clean of their leaves instead wore clothing flung from closets by the violent winds.

Some of the scenes defied logic - a bright yellow dandelion growing along a walkway leading to a roofless, collapsed house; a home with no front facade - reminiscent of a diorama box - with pictures still hanging on the walls and books still upright on shelves.

Some residents who had not yet evacuated Saturday morning ambled up and down the streets eyes wide, but dim. Others, like Doug Coates, tried to salvage some possessions, even if it was just a family picture or two.

For Jeff Racette, 402 East Grant, it was a bulldog named Boomer and a set of golf clubs.

The avid University of Kansas fan waited out the tornado in a rocking chair in his crimson and blue basement.

"You know how they say it sounds like a freight train," Racette said. "It sounded like wind to me, but then I heard it suck all the water out of my house."

After the storm passed, Racette took Boomer and the golf clubs and walked the eight blocks to the First Interstate Inn that his brother, Allen Racette, manages. The motel was one of the few structures in Greensburg to sustain minimal damage.

Around 9 a.m. Saturday, the Racette brothers headed back to Grant Street to assess the damage and grab some personal items.

Emergency personnel had spray painted "OK" on homes that had been checked for injured.

"They got an OK on my house," Jeff Racette said, surveying his roofless home and leveled street. "Hell if it's 'OK.' "

But like Coates, Racette said it's important to move forward and count your blessings.

"We're alive," he said, palms out, with a shrug.