Christmas felt different this year...

Christmas felt different last year for obvious reasons. It was 10 days after the fire and we were happy to be spending it together no matter what the location and with or without gifts. God's protection during the fire had been gift enough. 

Christmas felt different this year because we have been forever impacted and realize that people matter more than gifts. The house is not built yet so we celebrated at my grandma's house where my parents are living. Christmas felt different because the location didn't matter. We still did our traditional late night present opening and even later night pigs in a blanket breakfast! The location was different but the Love and appreciation for each other and the gift of life was even greater than before. Our appreciation for the giver of life and for the gift of His Son...for all His blessings and comfort over this past year... which has been a roller coaster. 2012 ended with the fire and 2013 held many struggles and heartaches as we dealt with family issues and the passing of my Uncle Dale. 2013 has also been full of happiness and joy as we welcomed new babies and the news of one to come in 2014! 

Christmas felt different this year...in a good way... last year we didn't care about the presents that got lost in the fire... because our parents were ok.  This year we were able to do gifts but we all knew that the only gift that mattered are the ones from God.  Gifts like our family and each minute together and of course Jesus. 

May we never forget what Christmas felt like last year...10 days after the fire. 

It felt different last year... and it felt different this year...and I pray it never feels the same again. 

-Stacy

It has been one year today

It has been one year today since the fire. A year ago right now Dwight and I were rushing over to my parent's house praying they were ok. Thank God they were. That was all we wanted... and yet He continued to poor blessings on us. All the things we found in the ashes that we thought were lost forever. And all of the Love, prayers, and support of friends/family/strangers! THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH! There are not enough words to thank you enough. 

Praise be to God and Merry Christmas! 
- Stacy

What a true blessing!

David and I are living with my Mom until our house is built. We are in the process of making one of the rooms we have usable as an office and my sewing room. We have been looking for furniture to help us do that. Stacy and Kelly have been keeping their eyes open for what we need. Stacy found a roll top desk on Craigs list and we went to look at it. David loved it and we bought it. The couple were so nice. In our visiting we found out that we all are Methodist. That was fun.

When we walked into the room where the desk was there were a bunch of items that caught my eye. I asked about a quilt top and she said she was going to take it all to good will but if I saw one that I'd like I could have it. Wow! I found one I wanted and then Stacy said something about our Made With Love Prayer shawl Ministry at UUMC. The lady said she had wanted to start one at her church but didn't know how. All of a sudden she was getting bags to put all of the quilt tops in. She and her husband were moving to Atlanta so they were cleaning out. she said she would rather give them to me than anyone else.  She loved that I found value in them. Some of the quilts her Mother had put together. I asked her if she were sure she was OK letting them go. Then she opened the closet and it was full of finished quilts that her Mom had made. Some of the ones on the bed were pinned together with batting and a backing material. They could be finished with a little time.
I was so excited about all of the stuff I almost cried. What a blessing it all is to me. Her neighbor had been visiting when we got there and she handed me a big bag. She had gone to her house and gotten two quilts that she had started awhile back. She said she would never finish them and wanted me to have them! How fun is that! The husband came into the room and we started talking about the neat miniature Coke case with Cokes in it that was on the dresser. He said it had been his Fathers. I told him about my Coke collection. He handed it to me and said for me to have it. Cool!

When David, Stacy and I left that day we knew that it was not just chance that Stacy saw the listing for the desk. They said no one else had called about it.
All I know is no one would have ever appreciated their generosity more than I did.

so many decisions to make

David and I are busy trying to decide on light fixtures, sinks, etc so our contractor will be able to order them for our house. I have also found some great second hand stuff that is really going to add that special touch that we are looking for. That has been fun and we are ready to have a place to put all of it. Never did I think all of this was coming our way. Just so many decisions to make. Life is good and we are excited to get the house started. When it does I will be posting pictures of the progress.

We put what we could save in a storage unit today...

We put things in storage unit today. Found this and we are looking forward to hanging this up again!

we are about to finalize our house plans

We are so excited because we are about to finalize our house plans. It is a hard process and one that we didn't think we were going to be doing. Build a new house???? We loved our home and have a lot of fantastic memories in it. We moved in 32 years ago and have been tweeking it to be like we wanted since then. We have raised 3 children there and we know that every day we shared there has made us who we are today. We have always taken pictures of happenings in our lives so thank God we have some of those pictures to remember our home Family Thanksgivings, Christmas', birthday parties , graduations and even our everyday life. We are so blessed. 

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We are on a roll again!

We are on a roll again! Plans are being completed and decisions are needing to be made. So glad we are moving forward!

recovery

Happy to have Phoenix to help with the recovery. 

Mom's shoulder surgery went well...

Moms in recovery! Wants to sleep. :-) everything went well! - Kelly

Phoenix is such a blessing!

He keeps us all on our toes! He likes to run around until he wears himself out and then takes a nap! It is still amazing to me how God provided him at just the perfect moment in this journey... he makes us all happy. We try to focus on the happy times and the good to come...he makes it a lot easier! - Stacy

Looking at house plans in progress

Last Sunday after church Brandon hosted us at his house for lunch. We had fun looking on pinterest and talking about our in progress house plans.

"The Slab"

I went by "the slab" (what we are calling it these days) today... it is such a strange sight. It all still seems so surreal sometimes. I wonder if it ever really sinks in... maybe after the new house is built? -Stacy

Treasures in the Ashes: Love letters from when David was in the Air Force

On the second day of the demolition of our house the man was able to get down to just 3 rooms. Our bedroom, my sewing room and the back bedroom were still standing. When they went to dump the trailer we went looking to see if there were any items in those rooms we needed to get. Stacy and David were bringing out a table from my sewing room and Stacy noticed that there was something that looked like a few letters under where they were walking. In this pic below you see that small white square on the bottom left? That is a stamp near the first few letters they found. Before she got too excited she showed them to David and he confirmed they were some of the letters we wrote back and forth while he was in the service. We were not sure where those were and were not sure if we had lost them in the fire or not yet. As we starting looking for more of them we saw that they were strewn all over the concrete. The large track hoe had made it very difficult for us to find the letters. It seems that when it was taking the house down it had found a pocket in the attic where the letters were.

Stacy and David had spent several days up in the attic digging for things that might not have been burned up. Everything that was in the attic was in large plastic bins and all of those were melted during the fire. When they did they formed a crust on top of everything under them. Stacy and David had to break through this crust and when they did they were able to find pockets of treasures. So it seems that these letters had been in a pocket that they were not able to get to because of the fallen roof.

Some friends of ours, Sallie and Roger, were visiting and when Stacy saw the letters Sallie and I started to search for the letters all over the slab. We found a lot of them and then we found some that were stuck under the claw of the large machine. Those we had to get after the men returned with the trailer and could lift the claw off the pile where the letters were.

While we were waiting we saw the Moma cat that had birthed Phoenix and his 2 siblings. She was crying and searching for her kittens. We were wanting to get those kittens out of the house before it was all destroyed. We thought we heard them and started the search. Stacy and David climbed up in the attic and didn't see them. Then we walked around the back of the house and heard them in the eaves. David started to tear them down so that they could get out. While we were in the back Stacy was inside the house and she was climbing on the counter tops to look for the kittens when she came upon a large amount of our letters to one another. They had fallen into our master bathroom. How fantastic! Below is a picture she took of our bathroom before she found the letters. Our love letters were beneath the heart shaped shelf!

She dug in the fallen insulation and found little stacks of letters and the stamps all thru out what had fallen from the attic! Most of them were wet and would need drying out.

Here are some pictures of the stacks she made while digging and how she found the letters:

I was so happy to have the letters that we had written while David was away in the Air Force for four years. I guess you could say some of our most personal feelings were in those letters and I was glad to have them to reread. We had both done a lot of growing up while he was away and I am so happy that after 6 years of dating we decided to make our life together.

When we got home that day I put as many of the letters as I could out to dry. We must have found at least 100 letters that we had written to one another. Fantastic!

  

- Sharon

blooming like crazy.

On my birthday, Feb. 3, all our kids helped us move potted plants, dig up what we could move and get everything ready for the demo of our house...My angel trumpet was dug up and planted out of the way. Look at it now, it is blooming like crazy. - Sharon

House is down

Three days of demo so far

Demo started yesterday...

We all took a spot early in the morning to watch the demolition. It was a surreal experience. It was Bittersweet day.

Our families last picture in front of our old house

Here is our families last picture in front of our old house. Tomorrow they start demolition.

Well the first of the big equipment was delivered to the house right before we left tonight..so they will begin taking our house down tomorrow! We will be there to see as much as we can. We had a great work day today getting ready for tomorrow.

-Sharon

Our last day at the house....demo starts tomorrow!

Today our family went and worked hard moving plants, digging and replanting some plants , moving whatever needed getting out of the way of progress that will take place tomorrow. We took Phoenix with us and he had a great time. Our good friends, Sallie and Roger Abbott came and helped us.

David worked hard to save my angel trumpets. 

David S. and I potted plants for him to take to his office. 

Phoenix explored his future yard and wore himself out. 

- Sharon

My cup (Mailbox) runneth over

Wow! My mailbox runneth  over with many sweet birthday wishes for me. Thank you all! My birthday is on Sunday and yes it its Super bowl Sunday!!! I have the flu and pray to be feeling better by then. 

Phoenix... Rising from the Ashes

HA so apparently my mom wanted to name the new kitten "Treasure" (Treasure found in the ashes) and dad wanted to name it "Phoenix" (as in rising from the ashes). Dad took the kitten to the vet just now and mom and dad had decided before hand, if it was a girl it would be her pick, and a boy it would be dad's pick. So apparently dad just texted mom and the new kitty's name is....PHOENIX!    - Kelly

We found Treasure today!

Look who we found today! Two Weeks ago we found 3 kittens that had been born in our bedroom. The next time we got back to the house the Mom had moved them. :( David found her this morning and she is going home with us.  -Sharon

We thought we had lost this. ..

A few years ago us kids gave mom painting stuff for Christmas so she could paint a scene she had talked about for years! ! It was the Lake at St. James place where my great grandparents lived. We would go fishing with them there and it was beautiful. Well mom painted it and it was beautiful.

After the fire we were trying to remember where it was in the house so we could see if it survived. We never could.

A Day ago I decide to re arrange our office closet and I came across a bag with this flat thing. That flat thing was my mom's art pad!  The first page was her painting! !!! I then remembered I had taken it to find a frame for it months ago! !!  We thought we had lost it. So glad I had it the whole time.

-Stacy

We found some of our baby things in the attic!

Buried under ashes and melted plastic container lids was some treasures from when we were babies. We had just accepted the fact that everything in the attic was gone. The night of the fire it burned for over an hour. So when my dad and I uncovered a pile of baby clothes in the attic we were astonished. Some of them are burned and can not be worn again BUT anyone who knows my mom knows she will figure out a way to make a blanket from the small pieces that survived for our future babies or some other way for them to be wrapped in our past (since they can't wear the baby clothes we all wore). Among the things we found were 2 of the rings we wore during our Christenings. A few seconds of fire on them and they would have melted. It is incredible the things that seem to have had a bubble of protection around them. God knew what would give us hope and enough strength to move on and rebuild. Since one of the rings was brandons and one was either kelly's or mine we have decided that our future kids... if they are a boy can wear brandon's and if it is a girl then the other one. :) - Stacy

Found more things today.

Found more things today. T-shirts from our childhood that we had saved over the years to make t-shirt quilts for each of us...enough to still do that survived. Some of my mom's journals! Some of my childhood artwork. God is good. - Stacy