You might be a REDNECK if….

….Your carport looks like this-

They have almost gutted both bathrooms and they have sucked the insulation out of the attic.  Most of the flooring is up now.  Seems like they could get a lot more done if they would actually work all day.  They probably would not like for me to be their boss.

Here are the main rooms affected.

In the meantime, we will be staying in the “little cabin in the woods”.

As of Friday, they have reserved this out to someone else.  So, we will be homeless after that.  We are praying that most of the work will be done by then.  They have a LONG way to go, considering I took the inside pics today.  God can and does work miracles though.  Hope to post something nice real soon!

God is ALWAYS there!

I know it has been quite a while since I have blogged, but we stay so busy.  I wanted to share our recent events and tell “the story” since so many people have inquired about  how it came about.  Dave and I left February 8th for a cruise to Mexico.  It was absolutely wonderful and much needed time together.  We were celebrating 12 years of marriage.  We came back home on Valentine’s Day and had a relaxing rest of the weekend.  Monday was a holiday-President’s day, so Dave was off work and the kids were out of school.  Mr. Type A personality, as he calls himself, decided we needed to mark things off of our to do list.  We had several dripping faucets, so he called the plumber.  One was on the outside of the house and had to be cut and torched back together.  Notice, I don’t know the technical terms.  As the plumber was leaving, he mentioned to Payton-”You might smell smoke in the pipes for a little while”.  Seemed odd to me, but I thought Payton must have heard wrong.  Payton had baseball evaluations that day and was itching to leave so we could go by the Army store and get whatever you need for baseball.  It was Monday-lab days for me, so I was on my lap top trying to look up lab results before we left.  I was going to call doctors with the results on the way to ball.  Moms have to multi-task you know.  My lap top was not working correctly, so I kept logging on and off and it would freeze up.  I was very frustrated at it and even more so since I knew Dave and Payton were in the truck waiting on me so we could all go.  I heard Dave yelling at me and I was about to fire something back at him to let him know I had to finish this before we left.  Then, I heard “Our house is on fire!” loud and clear.  While waiting on me, Dave had seen smoke coming from the eaves of the house.  He called 911 and we all ran outside.  Smoke was pouring from the top of the house and the attic.  It took 11 minutes for the fire trucks to get here, which is a long time while you watch your house burning.  They ran upstairs with their black hoses, ripping carpet fibers on the way.  Then they brought their axe in- not a good feeling.  The chopped through Josh’s bedroom wall where they found the insulation was on fire.  They did put out the fire in the end with their hoses.  So, we have lots of smoke and water damage.  Last we hear it is going to be around $20,000+ for repairs.  We are going to move to a cabin at the marina while they do demolition.  They are taking all of the insulation from the attic and walls in that area and replacing it.  They are replacing carpet, tile, sheet rock, den flooring, mattresses, entertainment center and whatever else is damaged once they get in there.  The actual place you can see doesn’t look that bad, but it is mostly under things that is damaged.  If you want to see how much stuff you collect in your attic over a 10 year period, stop by my house.  I thought we always lives in  chaos here, but this is ridiculous.  I will try to continue my blog with the progress as it takes place.

In the end, we are thanking God for messing up my lap top.  The firemen said if we had left, there would not have been a home to come back to.  We were also leaving Josh here- with ipod in ears and face in the computer.  I can only imagine what would happen.  God is so good to us.  We are going to get some really pretty things from all of it too.  Josh thought it was pretty cool that they chopped his wall, saying “now I don’t even have to go out of my room to get to the bathroom.       

Here is the way most of our house looks now.

But, at least I this to reflect back on, in the midst of our chaos.  We did have a calm before our storm.