The Day Our House Burned Down and What Happened After (Part 3)

(This is the third installment of our house fire story. If you haven't read the beginning, you may want to go back to Part 1 and then Part 2 to catch up!)


So, here we were. A family of five, one child still in diapers, and we got out of the house with the clothes (PJ's) on our backs. One small blessing was that we had some dirty clothes in the garage waiting to go in the wash, and since the garage is on the other side of the house from the fire, they were fine. We did a small load at my parent's house. Mom handed us some money and told us to go to the store to get some basics: diapers, wipes, toothbrushes, and an outfit for each of the boys.

After a night of practically no sleep, Shawn and I found ourselves walking the aisles of Target, trying to figure out what we really needed. I remember he got a phone call from his boss while we were there, and I remember having a crying fit right there by the shampoo. He had to get off the phone and hold me til I stopped. (I'm tearing up just remembering this!)

It's weird; I only remember little snippets of things that went on over those couple of days after the fire. I remember walking through Target with Shawn, getting phone call after phone call from concerned friends and family, people stopping by to see what they could do to help, just lots of things happening in a very short amount of time. Friday was spent trying to figure out what to do next.

<Insert short rant here>

One thing you will hear me preach now is that if you are renting, PLEASE get renter's insurance!! We didn't have it. We lost everything. And we didn't have the money to replace everything. If we had just spent the tiny bit of money per month (I think it's maybe $13-$17 per month!) we could have replaced everything brand new. Furniture, electronics, clothing, EVERYTHING. Don't make the same mistake, spend the money. Trust me on this.

<end rant>

This is the fireplace that my Grandpa built. The fire was "contained" in the hallway to the right. They didn't say anything about smoke damage.

We were informed by the Homeowner's insurance agents (thankfully, my parents own the house and have excellent HOI) that since we didn't have renter's insurance, we had to clean out the house if we wanted to save anything. There was no way I was going to be able to do this; I was still pretty much in shock (and actually stayed that way for quite a while) and Shawn is only one person. This is where my church family stepped in.

The renovators told us that while we were in the house, because of the damage and the fumes, we should wear gloves and respirators. People asked how they could help, and we told them about cleaning out the house. Saturday morning dawned, and what happened next still bring tears to my eyes.

But I'll leave that for tomorrow; dinner needs to be made!