Hey loved ones. If you have the link to this site it is because we’ve provided it to you with the hopes that it will help keep everyone in the know during these hectic times.

I’m going to keep the story as brief as I can, catch you up with our to do’s and let you know where we currently are in this post. A lot has happened in the last 3 days so I apologize if this is a little long.

Memorial Day just before 2:00pm – Hailey and Amy were both upstairs in their respective beds napping while Kenny was tinkering and organizing the garage. Our neighbor across the way, Peach, was leaving for a walk when she saw smoke coming from our roof. She pounded on our garage door yelling for us to get out. Kenny ran upstairs to wake up Amy to grab Hailey while he corralled the dogs. In mere seconds we were outside in Peaches garage watching as it spread from between our home and our neighbor’s home. Our entire driveway neighbor community was in that garage.

We would like to mention that most articles do have it wrong online – both homes affected had people in the structures – we were out before any form of public safety or fire arrived. It also took longer than 10 minutes to deal with the fire.

Turns out the fire started between the units. It was not electrical, nor was it something we could have prevented. Professionals are saying it is from an outside source like an ember from a BBQ (believable for the holiday) or fireworks. Basically: fluke/struck by lightning luck. Scary part was – it took 45 minutes for our smoke alarms to go off since the fire was in between two homes. It is mainly structural and water damage. Hailey’s nursery and our spare bedroom now have skylights that were not there before.

Since then, the fire Marshall has deemed that our roofing system was completely not up to code. The poor engineering made for a sort of tinder box under sheet metal under shingles that it was only a matter of time for something like this to happen. It also means that it was a miracle that it didn’t spread to the two end units in our building. What this could potentially mean in the future: all 107 units in our community that have this type of roofing could be red tagged along with our home because it is considered a major safety hazard. That is 107 families displaced.

Our community, the residents, have been incredible. The HOA, which we pay insane fees to monthly, is not. They have made false promises with support but end up backing out. Luckily we have some key witnesses acknowledging that the HOA manager made these promises to help hold up their end of the bargain.

Where we stand: THANK YOU HAWKINS FAMILY. Hal Hawkins, DVM, has been Amy’s main partner in veterinary medicine for almost a decade. He and his family have provided their lovely granny unit for us to stay in while we get this mess sorted out. In the coming week we will be moving to Amy’s Mom’s place in Woodland. There will be plenty of room. Ken will commute a couple-few days a week for work and to keep the home inspection/repair train moving. This Sunday there is a high percent of rain so tomorrow’s project is to get the roof covered.

We have gotten the same question from so many people: “How can we help?”. Truth is. We don’t quite know. At this point we are learning so much about what goes into catastrophes like this while trying to give a 2 year old some normalcy and happy moments that we are treading water. I’m sure when we get our heads above the water we will have no problems blowing the conch shell. Thank you all to those who have supported us. Whether it is a hug or temporary home, we greatly appreciate it.

We love you all. – Kenny, Amy, Hailey, Dodger and Kida