Christmas Flash Mob - little long but really good

Car Crashing into our House Update

So it has been a couple of weeks since Thanksgiving.  So far, we have been visited by a structural engineer, two city inspectors, contractors and assessors.

Here's our living room right now.  As you can see in the right side of the picture, the wall has no longer been merely boarded up, but framed for becoming a "real wall."

This morning a city of Greensboro inspector came to check over the work.  We have been so blessed and impressed with how quickly the city has been to check over work.  And Paul Davis Restoration (PDR), our contractor, has been great to work with and accommodating to do the work around our family's needs.

It looks like we will only have to move out of the house one more time (when they refinish the floors) but that will be longer than the original hotel living of six days. I think we may move between two hotels just so we can bother the maximum number of guests and hotel employees!  (Just kidding!)  But it does look like we will be back in the living room and dining room sometime mid-January.  As far as the outside masonry - no idea how long that will be.

Here's some other photos of our lives right now. This pile of broken pieces include a cedar chest that has a rug full of glass laying across it.  It was a really nice cedar chest filled with baby blankets made by my mom, my grandma, my great-aunt and my great grandmother.  Those precious things were the hardest to see amongst the rubble.

But PDR is doing their best to clean them and we will be keeping them (and not using them on future babies just in case of glass embedded somewhere).  The white object is a stand we used in our wedding (almost 12 years ago).  Neat thing though...the table (it's hard to tell it used to be a table) is also laying halfway on the bottom of the lamp was directly in front of the window.  It was (obviously) completely shattered and the items on top of it were thrown across the room.  Everything in the corner (from the table to the cedar chest to the globe) were damaged or completely obliterated.  ...except...

Here's a photo of our living room about 10 days before the accident.  We had decorated for Thanksgiving and Gracie wanted to take some photos.  Isn't that awesome?  It has definitely helped with the insurance situations.  If you look in the right hand corner, you'll see the globe, lamp, glass top table and cedar chest that you see the parts of in the above photo.  Notice right behind the lamp, you'll see our wedding picture.

Our wedding picture.  It was on the table.  It must have been launched into a pile of baby blankets,the loveseat, into the pile of dirt from the peace lilies that sailed across the room or some other soft place.  It's scratched up but not broken.

I don't know what to say - but it makes me happy to see our wedding picture still in tact.  In spite of being in direct harm, God chose to keep it unbroken.  It's just a photo.  But there is something extra sweet that it was protected.

God protected our family from physical harm.  He protected the gentleman in the SUV from injury.  He has blessed us with insurance and favor from city officials, contractors.  He has poured our blessings, prayers and gifts from neighbors, friends, church family, home school community, family members and fellow Cru staff.  We are extremely grateful.

Thank you for your prayers.

Love, Carra

P.S. Next time, I'll try to share how we are making our den into living room and dining room among it's previous roles as home school room, play space, my office area and meeting space. 

When a car crashes into a house on Thanksgiving Day

We weren't home. To say "Praise God" doesn't quite express it. When Zade's favorite box of toys were literally thrown across the room. When Faith's favorite couch was shoved so hard that it broke a table and prevented the front door from opening. That is much more than a "higher being" watching out for you.  That is my God who is protector, provider, sustainer, and Savior.
Thanksgiving Day. One week plus ago. A gentleman who was on his way to dinner at our neighbor's house went to repark and his accelerator got stuck and he hopped the curb, made an arch and a reasonably large hole in our house. He's okay. He could have hit the tree and he would have been badly hurt. He could have hit the center part of the living room and according to the structural engineer the upper floor would have likely fell in (Gracie and Faith's room).
Five feet. One car width give or take. But God allowed him to hit the window, and some brick. Oh it did some damage....but could have been so much worse.
I'm not sure how I feel. It's a pretty surreal experience. I do not like returning home from Thanksgiving weekend (we knew what had happened b/c we have awesome neighbors!) & going directly to a hotel. Even a nice one with breakfast. It feels so disconnected.
But now yesterday the structural engineer came, our assessor form Farm Bureau, our new friends from Paul Davis Restoration (who answered the phone on a holiday)....and we were cleared to move back home! We don't have use of our living room or dining room but that's okay. We put the baby gates back up to keep Zade out of there because of the glass shards.
We decided yesterday to work through our own homeowners insurance (& stop trying to get a major propery repair done through the auto insurance liability). The driver's insurance will still pay up to whatever liability limit he has, but this way we don't have to be the learning curve on this. It feels way better. Our assessor knows the business and how to make homeowners feel cared for. I appreciate that.  I promise...more updates as we go along.
Love, Carra