Since we're received so many phone calls, texts, etc. from people who have heard from other people, we want to contact y'all ourselves and let you know "from the horses mouth" a little more and that we are OK.
By now most of you know that on Easter morning, about 3:15am, we were woken to a fire starting in our house ceiling above the woodstove. For those of you that didn't know, at 3:15am on Easter morning I awoke to our smoke alarm bleeping 3 times. Something made me run out into the living room, where I looked up and saw a ring of orange around the ceiling where it meets the woodstove piping. We didn't know it at the time, but flames were shooting out of the soffit on the side of out house. We all got out safely, including the dogs and chicks, and are doing well given the circumstances. The house, on the other hand, will need to go through a major renovation before it is liveable. Though the fire damage itself wasn't great, water permeated our great room and is now seeping into our basement. The house reeks of smoke. Praise God, above all else, that we are safe and unharmed. The rest is just fluff. :)
For those of you who have contacted us - Thank You, from the bottom of our hearts, for the offers for help, prayers, and genuine concern you have given us. Your support means so much. At this time, we are just taking it day to day and our needs are minimal - we had good house insurance (Trav had double checked on our coverage after he was on a call for a fire about a year ago.). We are at an extended stay hotel in town, one of the few places we can stay and have the house dogs with us. Travis is commuting to Gun Lake and feeding the animals on the way to/from - unfortunately, our current location places much of the "FarM" duties on him. Hopefully within a week or 2 insurance will know why this has happened and have an expected timeline for restoration, and at that time more permanent living arrangements will be arranged - we're praying closer to Leighton, so Trav can continue his fire department and EMS roles, and so we can more evenly split up the FarM chores. If anyone knows of a rental something (we're flexible :) in Leighton let us know.
In other news, more Praises!, Trav found out yesterday that he was offered a position on the southwest MI Tactics team that he interviewed for a few months ago. HUGE PRAISE! I know Trav will be awesome in this role, congrats hon!
So, to recap, we are doing well. We are well aware that it could have been much, much worse. We have faith this will all work out for His good, and God has blessed us so much already that we know that He will work out the rest of the details, and give us the strength to carry on through this. We are so very, very thankful for all of you and thank you for taking the time to check in. We feel very loved.
God's Love, Grace, and Peace from the FarMasselinks.
