THE night

Just when we thought this year couldn't possibly be any worse, we found ourselves living another  nightmare. At 2:30 am the smoke detectors started blaring.  We jumped out of bed and as soon as we turned on the lights we could see and smell smoke. Rushing to find the source we made our way to the garage. The door was blackened and hot so Trent ran out the front door and immediately saw flames coming from the garage. He started yelling to get the kids out of the house. I ran upstairs and got Rome then ran in to get Denver. He had slept in Scout's bed that night but he wasn't in there when I got there. Apparently when Trent yelled into the house "get the kids out!", Scout took it upon herself to do just that.  She heard dad yell that and ran up to get Denver.  And because she's a great sister, she also ran back up and got his beloved Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal for him. At some point in the night Maxon ended up on my floor so I ran in and woke him up and we all ran out the back door. By now the garage was totally in flames and there were small explosions going on in there. Our neighbors started coming out and I took the kids into their house. The fire trucks showed up and got to work. Everyone but Kathy's dog Abby made it out.

  

Because we have the best neighbors in the world, we had a complete basement set up right away and eventually I got the kids settled down.  It took them quite a while to fall asleep, it was probably 4:30-5 when they finally did.  Poor little kids have been through more trauma this year than any kid should every have to.  Once the kids were settled I joined Trent and the rest of the neighborhood (because they were all awake by now) on the neighbors porch across the street.  And we all just sat and watched it burn.  A lot of emotions going on in those early morning hours.  I later learned the emotions I was feeling, and the emotions Trent was feeling weren't exactly the same.  If you know my husband, you know he's constantly brewing up big plans for changes in the house.  Knocking down walls, painting walls, etc.  As he sat and watched it burn he thought of all the new things he was going to do in building his new house.  Not exactly the thoughts going on in my mind.  At least, not right away.

 That day is all a little hazy.  A lot of talking to fire chiefs and investigators and such.  It took them quite a while to actually get the fire totally out, but eventually we were told it was safe to go inside and assess the damage.  The actual fire mostly destroyed the garage, mud room, laundry room, Kathy's room, toy room and the entire roof.  But the rest of the house was completely engulfed in smoke and everything was covered in soot in the end.  

There's my car....

 
It has been completely overwhelming to experience the love and support from those around us. 
We have amazing friends and neighbors who took great care of us.  Within hours we had boxes and boxes of clothes for each child.  We had multiple people give us the keys to their cars.  I literally had money shoved in my pockets that I have no idea where it came from.  We also had many people offer their basements for us to stay in.  We ended up at the Millers and they were so amazing and made us feel totally welcome.  We stayed there for 2 weeks, until we found a house to rent.  We are now in the rental and will be here until the house is rebuilt.  We aren't sure how long that'll take, hopefully sooner than later, but I'm not counting on it being too soon.  Now that the dust has settled we are just counting our many blessings.  We were able to get the most important and only irreplaceable things out of that house and that's all that really matters.  We don't need stuff as long as we have each other!