Vandalism

We met with the insurance company, fire inspector and others at the Francis house today.  The fire inspector determined that on Wednesday night some people came to steal our A/C unit.  They cut wires and rattled it around, but for some reason couldn't get it.  However, their tampering caused an electrical fire which, as you know, was discovered and extinguished Thursday early am.  On Monday evening, after the holiday weekend, we stopped by and all was well with the house.  On Tuesday afternoon I went back and found the A/C unit like this:

The top was popped and the insides were stripped.  Today when we returned we found this:

Gone!  So, at some point last night they finished the job.  Yeah.  Really.  I can hardly believe it myself, but this was the fire inspectors assessment.  

So, Citizens Insurance did right by us today and we have every confidence that they will continue to do so in the future.  I hope to sing their praises (and God's!) during this process!  Jon & I have many decisions ahead: do we rebuild, tear down, sell?  But, today was a good day.

Through the Fire and Flames

I've considered starting a blog for quite some time now, but I guess it took a house fire for me to actually do it.  With all of your care and concern regarding the house fire, 

I thought this would be the time to start.

On Thursday, September 2 at 6:45a our neighbor, Shayne, rang our doorbell and notified us that our house was on fire.  When we purchased the house we live in, on Aurora, we rented out our home on Francis.  We had a fantastic experience with three guys who rented for three years.  It worked out very well.  Their lease was up August 31 and we were having the house painted, fixing it up and interviewing new tenants when it burned.  

We have quite a task ahead of us dealing with this and we have a lot of questions and concerns.  

More on this and more of our life - happier things! - are yet to come via this blog.  Here are a few before and after photos of the house.  Thanks for your prayers, help, friendship and love.  We will make it through the fire and flames.