Chimney Fire!!!

Saturday night, we were getting ready to leave the house to go eat dinner with Michael's family when Michael went downstairs to check the fire in our fireplace before we left.  We have an insert in our fireplace to where we can heat our house to keep our heat pumps from running so much.  He went down and opened it and it just erupted into flames.  He closed the fireplace door and went outside.  Our chimney was roaring like a freight train.  We had a chimney fire!!! Our first ever at our home.  Being a mom, first thing I did was grab kids and head out the door.  E was panicking just like me.  I put them in the truck and ran them to my mother in laws so they would not be so scared.  I came back home to wait on the fire department.

The fire department got there when flames were shooting out of our chimney!  I was scared to death.  If I wasn't freaking out so bad I may have taken a pic of my house but I was too afraid to look.  I just started walking down my driveway in the cold and dark, crying and praying.  For those of you who have never been to my house, my driveway is about 1/2 mile long so along the way on my walk, my parents walked up, my grandfather and his wife and a friend from our old church.  The road had been blocked so no one else was allowed to drive down our driveway so that is why everyone was walking.

Thank goodness the firemen got the fire out with this powder stuff and cleaned everything out.  I am so thankful for volunteer firemen!!!  I am so thankful to God that the fire stayed in our chimney!!  Once, everyone left about 2 hours after this all started, we went to get E and M from my mother in laws.  I did not realize till then that poor E did not have on socks or shoes when we were running outside.  She said they teach them to get out of the building at school and her shoes were downstairs with the fireplace and she wasn't going down there!  Poor thing she was so upset when it happened.  We are praising God for His protection upon us all!  It has been one more weekend but God is good!

A Summary of our December......

I know I have  not really posted much lately.  Blogging is just not a high priority on my list right now.  I think about things I want to put on here but when you work almost full-time, have activities with the kids and dealing with Michael's schedule, I do good to get to post anything.  Our December, like everyone else's, was busy.  Here is just a summary of what has been going on:

E and I ran our first 5K together with the Girls on the Run program at her school.

Me and E after our 5K.

E and all of her best friends.  These girls stick together.

We had alot of fun and I really enjoyed running.  Thanks to the advice from my running experts, Deidre & Rita, I was able to train with the couch to 5K program and survived the 5K.  I have actually found that this is something that me and E enjoy so we are trying to keep it up.

The whole month we tried to spend as much time as possible with Michael's brothers family because they were moving to northern Virginia at the end of December.  They are 5 hours away!  We have only been 15 minutes away since forever ago.  It has been hard and I have wrestled some very strong emotions with this whole move.  I can't really express my true feelings but I have had to talk to God alot about my attitude with the whole situation.

E, C, M & G on their last night in NC.
S & R went home for their last night.

The kids both had their Christmas plays at church and I was so very proud of them both.  M spoke his part without hesitation and E sang a solo and did sign language for another song.  M also had his Christmas program at his preschool. 

M also turned 5 this month!!!

M with his preschool class having birthday party.

I can't believe kindergarten is right around the corner!  On M's birthday, I took off work and wore my super mom cape that day.  After we dropped E off at school, we ran to Krispy Kreme to get doughnuts for his class.  We had a little party with his friends at school.  After the party, I left him to have fun at school and went back to E's school to do a holiday craft with her class.  After we were done, I got her out of school early and we met her Grandma Barbara, Mason & the cousins at Pin Station for another little birthday party.  They had fun bowling and playing games!

M opening gifts at the bowling alley.

Of course, we also had Christmas parties and get togethers.  I will post next about our Christmas weekend.  I haven't uploaded my pictures yet (little behind huh?).  Well, I'll post about that soon.  I learned something that weekend that hit so close to home.  Something we all take for granted.  More coming soon!

Boy, do I owe someone an apology!!!!

Last month, I posted about little M charging $100 worth of bullets on my credit card for a game on my phone.  Boy was I wrong!  It never showed up under my iTunes and last week I got charged another $100 and last week more charges from other places. So guess what??? I owe my little man a big apology.  Instead of him charging on my credit card so innocently, my number has been stolen.  Yes, stolen!  I am getting charges from all over and yes I am a little panicked but I pray my bank can work it all out.  M, I am soooo sorry.  I love you!! You can play Angry Birds on my phone all you want now!!