It’s been a little while since I’ve given an update on our home progress, and I started working on compiling photos yesterday so I thought today would be a great day to kind of recap what happened and where we are.

For those of you who are new to the Green Tree Media family or who are just visiting my blog, you might not know that October 10 last year, we lost our home and nearly all of our belongings to a house fire. The fire inspector informed us that the fire was started by a an electrical socket on our back porch. The socket arced and lit our old wood porch on fire like kindling. It quickly spread through our house. Ryan, myself and the dog got out of the house with nothing more than the clothes on our backs and our phones to call the fire department.

I realized as I was going through all of the photos yesterday that I was tearing up a bit on some of the photos. At the time this was all happening, I was still in shock and numb to it. I saw my things charred, melted, or just completely nonexistent but I didn’t feel anything. I don’t think I could process it… There was too much that needed to be done. I had to replace all my equipment, get the bare essentials we needed to get by, deal with insurance agents, start compiling a list of our belongings, try to recreate my tax paperwork and other work documentation, etc..

So yesterday looking through these pictures was the first time I actually looked at them and saw them for what they were… images of the remains of my HOME and the sentimental things that I CAN’T replace. Like the blue bird of happiness in my bridal bouquet that was my mom’s. Or our wedding video that my good friend Lee made for us. Or the love letters Ryan wrote me while we were dating and engaged. Or my stuffed dog, Curly, that my Grandpa Karl gave me when I was little… I can’t replace those things because they were moments in my life… they were real things that can’t be recreated. And I’ll be honest – it makes me sad. I cried while looking through these pictures, recalling what I lost. It felt good to let it out – silly as it may seem.

It’s been a slow process but progress is finally starting to be made and I feel like we’re getting closer and closer to having our own home once again! We were blessed with a non-snowy winter (although the rain and damp weather didn’t help us move forward much either). But at this point in the game – Demolition is complete… Concrete was poured for the basement last week… And according to our contractor – the building will begin on Friday! (Woot! Woot!) I cannot even begin to express how excited I am at the prospect of actually having the framework of our home in place!

I’ll admit, I’m a little sad that the new house will look nothing like the old one, but the interior layout is going to be so much nicer – I’m sure I’ll get used to it 😉 We do have our official blue print… which I actually have hung up on a wall here and I find myself going to look at it almost everyday. It’s a wonderful tangible reminder of what I have to look forward to.

The past few days however, I’ve been obsessing over siding and shingle colors. I’m not sure what I want to do with that yet. And my original idea has been shifted by feedback from both Ryan and the contractor. So we’ll see what I decide on tonight – since I promised our contractor I’d get him a selection by tomorrow.

Well thanks for putting up with my rambling. I hope you’re all having a wonderful Wednesday and that you’re finding some time to enjoy this awesome weather! See you on Friday!!!

Contact Me | Visit My Website | Join the Facebook Fan Page | Follow Me on Twitter