House Fire

Sunday August 25, 2010 at about 1pm we had a house fire.  We were away for the day and received a call that the house had burned and the dogs were let out safely.  We made it home as quickly as we could, which had to be about an hour, and found that to be true and that after both running off only Mabel had returned to the house.  Stella roamed the neighborhood and managed to evade 30 or so people that spend the next 12 hours searching for her.  She eventually returned to the house extremely frightened at about midnight that night, we had decided to camp out on the lawn until she came back.  Everyone was safe in the end and that is what is the most important of course.  The most fire damage is to the roof so that will be completely removed and replaced, al the way down to the trusses.  The entire rest of the house sustained water and smoke damage, some areas worse than others.  They were able to save some of the contents but much of it was a complete loss, including the bikes, kayaks, camping gear, tools, all the holiday decorations and the few things we had here from our childhoods.  Plans are already underway for the rebuild and if all goes well we could be moving back into the house in February, which seems like a long time but honestly they are basically rebuilding our entire house so I would expect it to take that long.  Until then we are staying with friends that have a guest house, it's cozy and the dogs get to roam the 5 acre wooded lot with four other Ridgebacks all day every day.  We figured they won't want to go back home after all that time, they'll be too used to having all this space and fun everyday.  Watch the House Projects section for the rebuild.