The Day Our House Burned Down and What Happened After (Part 2)

So yesterday, I told you the beginning of when our house went POOF.

Of course, I called 911 back.

Fire trucks came. Since we live in a rural area, they had to bring pump trucks, because we don't have fire hydrants. I had also called my parents, who live right across the field. They came, and we watched the firefighters work. After a little bit, the boys became grumpy, so Mom and I took them over to their house to let them go back to sleep.





Me and my boys, still in our pajamas; about 4am.

 

 

I got on Facebook and asked for prayer. A friend that is living in Pakistan called me to see if we were all right.  I took this picture from my mother's couch that morning:

 

That is my house, with 6 fire trucks in front of it. Shawn and my Dad were still there until the fire trucks left around 5am. The firefighters said that the fire was "contained to the hallway area", so I thought that meant things were better than they actually were.

You see, when Shawn went back into the house to find the fire, he found smoke coming from the attic access door. When he opened that door, as he was looking up, he saw more smoke coming from the closet door to his left. He opened the closet door and found the source. There was a blanket that had fallen onto a bare light bulb. We never turned that light on, but we had little children in the house. Somehow, that light had been turned on during the day, and it smoldered all that time. When he found the smoldering blanket, he pulled it out, stomped on it (with bare feet !!!!??!!) and thought it was out.

But it wasn't.

Since the firefighters said that the fire was contained, I thought "oh, ok. It's not so bad. We'll be back in there quick." I went over there to look at things (I was told not to, but I'm hard headed like that) because I just knew I was right.

What I saw made me melt into a puddle of goo.

My bookshelf; the bathroom is on the right

Looking into the burnt hallway from the living room

The attic access, um, hole (there used to be a door there)

This is the closet where the fire started

  We had a discussion with the insurance agents and the renovation people on the front porch of my house that day. We asked how long it would take for the house to be livable again. The renovation guys said 4 to 6 months.