Moving day?

Bart' s spray painted thank you message to our neighbors (sorry its blurry)


Yesterday a moving van pulled up to my house and began day one of removing the contents of our house.  Strange because three days ago I didn't know we were moving!

Yesterday was a great day - more laughter than tears.  We ventured back to the 'burb for the first time for Caroline and I to go to a girl scout event and Bart and the boys purchased a new phone for me (actually my phone was a generous gift from the Apple Store-insert hip, modern commercial here).  It probably doesn't sound like a big deal to get a new phone but my old phone (which had been in the house and we shouldn't have removed but I needed all of my numbers) smelled like an inferno and so every time I used it I was smelling the fire.  We then took the boys to their swimming lessons and seeing them laugh and play in the water was AWESOME!

The best part of yesterday was the warm embrace of so many of our friends.  Our hugs are extra long now. The gift cards, the gifts for the kids hand-picked by their friends, the construction paper cards with marker drawings - all overwhelming and all FILLED our car for our trip back to Illinois.  So much so that we had to go to Target (count is now up to 5 visits in the last 3 days) to purchase totes for the kids' new things.

Every night at dinner (for about a year now), we go around the table and tell each other about our thumbs up and thumbs down for the day.  Aside from the obvious thumbs up of our safety, our family and our friends and the obvious thumbs down of the fire itself,  here are my thumbs up and thumbs down moments of the past two days:


thumbs up:     seeing friends, finding one of William's first t-shirts on eBay,  William showing some affection to Bart and I, driving in the car as a family of five (something that felt normal because we were in a space that we own), pedicures with Caroline and my mother-in-law, reports from my neighbors as to what they can recognize coming out of the house (Owen's red dresser handmade by Bart!), discovering that my needlepoint Christmas stockings and ornaments  were unaffected by the fire because they were in the garage attic.

thumbs down:   William chanting stop, drop and roll, stop, drop and roll, moments when we remember something else that is gone forever, the fact that Red Cross toothbrushes hurt your gums (note to self-must make trip #6 to Target), Bart thinking it was Sunday all day and that is why our first bags of emergent clothes from the restoration company did not come (they told him Sunday),  my calendar smells so bad (again, shouldn't have removed from house, but had too) - I can only stand to have it out of its sealed bag for a few minutes at a time to transfer dates to a new calendar, my 154 just cut squares of fabric that I collected for a long time for my current project - a polka quilt - are too damaged to be restored.

It's a very strange thing to not recognize anything you own.  I don't recognize our laundry.  I don't know if the chap stick in my neighbor's coat pocket is mine or theirs (I didn't use it just in case!)  Every toiletry, every pair of socks, every toy is new.  We finally had to take a Sharpie marker to our toothbrushes so we could remember which one belonged to each of us.

Tomorrow I see the upstairs of the house for the first time.  Your prayers are appreciated!