Friday's Fire

A beautiful photo of me and the kids outside on the patio? 

It's not quite what you would think...

Note Delilah and William's frowns and James' bassinet next to us outside. 

We had a stove fire. 😲

And again, also not quite what you'd think. 

We were getting ready to go away for a few days and I had packed all our clothes in laundry baskets and put them on the stove along with all sorts of things we needed to remember to bring along. Somehow both elements turned on when I put the basket on and it caught fire. Providentially I caught it before there was too much damage and got the kids out of the house quickly. 

We lost the basket with Will and my clothes. Also burned were a few diapers, four baby blankets, Delilah's pillow, and William's blankie. 

We feel very blessed that the kids clothes were all okay. 

Delilah was very distraught about her pillow, and we hope to cut the burnt pieces off of William's precious 'deedee' so he can keep it. 

I can imagine that if they lost their clothes that would be really hard for them to process.

Thankfully the stove is right across from the sink so I was able to spray everything with the faucet and I filled a bowl with water to splash the persistent embers. 

Sweet James slept the entire time. Completely oblivious to the fact that his mom just carried him over flames and that he was now sleeping outside. 

I'm so grateful that he was napping in his bassinet and I could just pick the whole thing up and give him a safe space to be in outside. 

My mom picked up Delilah and William for some distraction and fresh air. 

Also thankful it was a sunny day and we could comfortably sit outside. 

Will came home from work early to help clean up while I took inventory of what was burnt and what we needed to replace. 
I called him during work hours which is technically against his shop's rules and it was very unexpected that he even answered the call as he usually has his phone off. His boss didn't even let him finish explaining the situation before sending him home. Not because he was upset about the phone call, but because he thought Will should be home to help out.  

I thought the stove was toast, but Will lovingly laboured on it and got all the melted plastic off and polished it right up. 

By the end of it we lost 18 articles of clothing, not including socks and underwear. 

We joked how in a situation like this it sure backfires to be a minimalist. 

Will lost his Sunday pants and PJs. I lost my all my pants and nursing tops (asides from the ones I was wearing). My socks were all melted together. My cozy hoodie was a goner, and Will's knit shirt that was my favourite on him. 

Will and I went shopping already and replaced most of the things that were on our 'need' list. There's a few more items that are secondary needs, and a bit more on a 'sometime in the future' list. But we've got the almost all our necessities back. 

We kept saying over and over again how it really was a 'best case scenario' (if those are even possible with house fires) in that our family is safe and there was no damage to the house. Only our clothes. And those are very minor things. 

To quote Delilah, "God keeps us really safe today".