A Family Loss Due To Fire

As originally posted on Kristie's Notes...


At 12:30 a.m. on Tuesday morning, an old friend of mine lost her home, her belongings, her husband, her 4 year old son and her 8 month old daughter to a fire. She was saved by a neighbor who put a ladder up to her bedroom window. Her 12 year old step daughter also made it out on her own. The neighbors tried to put a ladder up to the children's window, where their father was trying to save them, but were unable to due to the smoke and flames. The fire department was able to remove her husband and children from the home within 10 minutes of arriving, but as I already mentioned, it was too late.

I've been having a hard time keeping my eyes dry for the last couple days. I know her story and this isn't the first time I've cried for her. When we were in high school, I remember going to the funeral home for visitation for her mother who passed away. I cried again for her at her wedding where they had a rose and picture of her mother set up front with the thought that her mother was smiling down on her wedding from heaven. At those times I couldn't imagine going through life and getting married without my mom by my side. Now I couldn't imagine the rest of my life without my husband by my side and watching my children grow.

This friend, Amanda, is only 27 and has suffered unimaginable loss. She could use a lot of prayers right now and, because she has lost everything, she is in great need of financial support as well. I don't have a very large reach on my little blog, so I was hoping that some of you could help me spread the word by blogging about this as well.

Her work place has set up the 'Buckland Family Trust Fund' at the Eastern Michigan Bank, but they are also accepting donations, for those who cannot make it to the bank, at the following address:

Ullenbruch's Flower Shop
C/O Amanda Buckland
1839 Lapeer Ave
Port Huron, MI 48060


***Update: There is now a Paypal account set up to accept donations. You can reach the donation page by clicking on the button below. If this donation button doesn't work, please use the one at the top of my sidebar (upper left-hand corner of my blog).

Again, I know this time of year is super busy and times are tight, but if you can please help spread the word and/or send a donation-no matter how small, every little bit helps. Of course, if you don't have the means to help in either of those ways right now, prayers are greatly appreciated! :-)

Thank you to everyone who has expressed their condolences already and to those of you who have been praying for Amanda and her daughter. I will be sure to pass on your thoughts and prayers to Amanda when I see her at her family's funeral tomorrow. (Typing 'family funeral' is not easy! Phew!)

*I also want to send out a safety reminder to anyone who reads this. Make sure you have smoke detectors installed in your house and that you change the batteries twice a year. (The recommended times to change them is when you change yours clocks for daylight savings time.)

**If you would like to read more about this horrible tragedy, you can do so here.

Buying A Home In Today's Economy

Since the housing "boom", I've been really paying attention to the housing market. Where I am, the Phoenix metro area, it's been pretty bad. I'm not a real estate agent or even in the real estate field. I just like to be a knowledgeable buyer. I've been seeing how the market is trending and saw that the prices were due to stop dropping right around the first month or so of 2009.

I discussed this with my husband and told him that we should try one more time to buy and if it's not the right time, then we will know.(we had tried a few times prior but, were approved for a tiny amount). So we contact a HUD approved company and after a little glitch we started on a path to purchase.

I've heard the stories about purchasing a home. I know it's is a pretty heavy process and can be a stressful one, at best. I have been pretty calm and collected during this process with very little expectations. I know that it takes time and money to get the end result and yet, at the same time I have to be able to plan some things. We found out that we're going to have an extension and even though it's the banks fault, we get to pay a penalty. Even better, we found out there is probably going to be another extension. As of right now, we are six months total into this process.

We extended our lease an extra four months and gave our notice this month. Real estate agent said "we are extending" so we talk to the leasing office and to our surprise, they've already rented out the apartment. GREAT! Now we are going to be inconveniencing my Brother and his family by staying there for a week and a half.(please God don't let it extend for any more time)

So, now I'm frustrated. Mostly because we will have to put everything in storage, take a few things over to my Brother's, have no time to paint the house before we move in, and lastly have to cram a couple of days worth of cleaning into a day. I know the end result is going to be great, I just wish it would have gone a little more smoothly. Ah well!