You smell something burning?....

Guess where these guys are?

My house.

My house caught on fire.
Yes, I'm talking about the brand new house that Lance and I designed, built and just moved into 6 months ago.
It was Sunday, Sept. 20.
We BBQ'd for dinner, then a few hours later Lance and Lauren went to a Standards Night fireside at the church. When they got home, Lance smelled "something burning", but didn't think too much about it because we live in the country--people burn things.
After getting all of the kids to bed (by now it was around 9:00) Lance, who teaches early morning seminary, was getting ready to prepare his lesson for Monday morning and try to get to bed early since he has to be up at 5am. When he walked into the kitchen to grab his seminary stuff, he smelled "something burning" again... Checking the dishwasher and realizing it was nothing in there, he stepped out onto our covered patio (that is part of the house) and looked around outside. When he turned the light on out there he found lots of black smoke pouring out from under the countertop and out the sink of our outdoor kitchen. He then calmly grabbed the fire extinguisher and came to our bedroom and announced. I think our house is on fire.
I, not so calmly, jumped out of bed yelling, "call 911, call 911!!!" I of course can't FIND a phone, so I look like a headless chicken running around the house yelling, "Where's the stupid phone?!??! I need to call 911!!"
I have no idea what Lance was doing at this time.
Probably watching me thinking, "She's gone crazy", when instead, he probably should have been helping me find the stupid phone so I could call 911.
FINALLY I find a phone and dialed 911--I was kind of scared to because we're always taught you shouldn't do that unless it's an emergency... but I figured "burning smell" and lots of black smoke...warranted an "emergency".

Lance finally made himself useful and got the kids up and out of the house. :)
I was on the phone with dispatch telling them that we didn't dare open up the access panels under the counter for fear of fanning the flame. But they told me to get my hose and do it anyway. Lance came back after getting the kids settled out front to see me squirting water everywhere with the hose while on the phone. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?!??" he yells at me--"SHE TOLD ME TO DO IT!!!!" I yell back pointing at the phone. The nice lady on the phone then tells me I'd better go flag down the firetruck, since we have no street lights or house numbers and our driveway is over 200 feet long.....so I do it...in my PJ's mind you...at least it was my cute pink and white striped ones....no shoes...ouch.

The firemen get out and I lead them to the back of the house where Lance has taken over my job of squirting the hose. As we come around the side of the house, I yell, "You got those hot dogs done yet hon?--company's here!!" Those firemen have a good sense of humor cuz they laughed.

I then left all of them to do their business--meaning putting out fires--and went around front to see how my kids were doing

here they are waiting.

Chase realized we forgot and left the dog in the house--actually, I didn't "forget"...I just didn't care :) (see previous posts) But went and got the stupid little puppy to keep Chase from hyperventilating.

Here are the nice firemen tearing out my BBQ and countertop trying to get to the flames which were underneath and heading up inside the wall....

They did a good job and got it all put out before it had a chance to travel up inside the wall to the upstairs.

These guys were good sports too--Wyatt, who is in kindergarten-- had the class Mascot "Tuffy" staying with us at the time, so "Tuffy" had to get a picture with the firemen

The firemen told us if we had just gone to bed, the fire would have continued up in the wall to the roof, at which time, it would have been too late and we would have lost the house....as seen in exhibit A

Exhibit A

They also told us that the reason for the fire was because the whole thing was not installed correctly by our moron builder--who instead of hiring someone who knew what they were doing to do it, decided to save a buck and do it himself--which I could do an ENTIRE other post about, but will spare you....you're welcome. Needless to say, the builder (and his insurance) are taking care of it...but the entire thing will need to be ripped out and done properly with cinder blocks for framing instead of 2x4's which, incidentally, are flamable.

Did I mention that the BBQ is hooked directly to our 500 gallon propane tank buried in our front yard?...No?,,,just sayin'

All in all, we recognize how close we came to major tragedy, but recognize also, the blessings of our Heavenly Father in His sparing us this particular trial. In talking to the kids after everything was over--if we lost the house--it's just a house--the most important thing is that everyone was safe...even the stupid dog. Anyway, it's not like we haven't lived in our trailer before... :)

The next day, Wyatt and "Tuffy" pretended to put out the fire

Then for Family Home Evening, we took some pie and ice cream to the firemen to thank them
and they let the boys and "Tuffy" crawl all over and through their trucks and stuff, which they thought was pretty cool--it also made for some great pics for Wyatt's "Tuffy" journal he had to do for school. :)