Day 8----May 28th (friday)
Morning. So here we were actually 1 week after the fire.
Since the morning of my dizzy spells I was a little cautious as I got up for the day. Glad I was getting stronger every day and I needed it. My day was going to be a full day. As I wait for the restoration office to call I continue with my list. This is how I started making a list of my belongings. I mentally visioned what I had in every room and that's how I wrote it down in the scribbler. Taking pictures of the apartment helped jog my memory as well even though I didn't take pictures of every shelf in the cupboard or every corner. Another list that I started on was a grocery list & immediate household items that we would need.
I also packed up our items that I had bought into a tote which wasn't much but still took a lot of space in the back seat of the car.
Once the restoration office called I got ready to go to the apartment. It was almost noon time by the time I was in the apartment suite. My contact person (Karen) gave me insurance worksheets and a clipboard. I really didn't know where to begin so Karen helped me in starting my list.
(Here is an explanation of what the restoration crew does. They were assigned to removing items from the suites once it was cleared from the head person and after the tenant had signed a release form. Items that could be salvaged would be packed up by the crew and taken to their restoration site in Wpg if that is what the tenant requested. Another option was for the tenant to remove his or her own things at their own cost. Any cleaning that the restoration site would do would still be taken out of the tenants insurance coverage.)
So we started going through my belongings to see if anything was salvageable, if it wasn't worth keeping it went onto a pile. As we did that I wrote it on my worksheet e.g "Samsung TV". Some things you couldn't list or put a price on ... like photos. I did list my photo albums, but I still removed them from the apartment (It was the living room/ dining room area where we started). TIP--The best way to store photo albums on a shelf is to have them stacked on top of each other not beside each other. I had them stacked and by doing it that way the heat of the fire had melted the plastic & sealed the album. I had saved a lot of photos by keeping my albums in such a manner. If there was anything I could keep or would like to keep it was put into a plastic bag or box. Since Ruby wasn't able to help that afternoon her friend Carl came to help with whatever he could. Shortly after I had started listing things on my worksheets Karen gets called about lunch. She asked if I'd be okay on my own and I said yes, so she excused herself for lunch. I was by myself for a little while before Carl came to help. It was slow going and disheartening as I rummage through things. We could have spent hours going through my belongings, but the head man of the restoration crew or security crew put a stop to it very quickly. When Karen came back from lunch the head man came into my suite as well and asked what we were doing here. He also asked about insurance coverage and said I was totally covered with the amount I gave him. He insisted that we get out ASAP and that I would get my full coverage. The reason he said to get out ASAP was because it wasn't very safe again to be in the apartment. The ceilings were starting to buckle from the weight of the water on the floors above our suite. It was quite noticeable in the bedrooms. So we were literally rushed out of the apartment without making a proper list of my belongings. Karen asked if I had taken pictures or made some notes of belongings, which I had the best I could. We briefly check things in the bedroom to see if anything could be removed.
These are the items I removed from the apartment: photo albums, some movies, music CD's, computer tower, jewellry boxes, totes with fabric & blankets, stainless steel noodle machine & stainless steel stock pot. I had a large photo frame of Melody (3 years old) in my bedroom and a 8 x 10 photo frame of Ruby (flower girl photo) in her bedroom that I quickly snatched up as well even though they were slightly damaged. Ruby also had some grad photos in a ziploc bag which didn't look too bad. (Thankfully she had given most of her grad photos to family & friends before the fire). We put all these items into large plastic bags or cardboard boxes that the restoration crew provided. The computer tower was damaged, but I wanted someone to take out the hard drive and see if the info on it could be saved. The photo albums were damaged, but the photos looked okay and the same applied to the jewellry boxes & jewellry. As for the totes they were sealed so I was hoping the contents inside would be fine. We didn't remove any clothes or shoes. Now with the little bit that I was removing from the apartment I needed to store it somewhere so it could air out. I didn't want to stink up someone's place. As we were finishing up at the apartment Ruby came since she was done with her day of school. Before leaving the apartment I had to sign some forms with Karen which stated that whatever was left in the apartment was getting discarded by them, nothing was worth cleaning. The 2 items that I questioned was the rocking chair (which was my grandparents) and the stereo with record player (70's style inherited from mom & dad's estate which I was really holding for son Phillip). In the end I let them go. Now that I had taken what I wanted I needed to make a quick phone call about storing it in a friend's garage, plus a truck to transport the items. Carl called his grandfather and asked to borrow the truck and he was kind enough to do so. We transport the items to a garage which had easy access and then we could go through it on our own time and not be rushed.
After the truck was returned we got some air mattresses from Carl's place and take them to our new apartment. This was Ruby's first time seeing the apartment and she really liked the kitchen area.
Now it was time to do a little bit of shopping, so we head over to Winkler.
First stop was Canadian Tire (my work place). Since I hadn't been at work all week due to how I had felt I thought it would be nice to touch base with my boss (Dave). We go upstairs to Dave's office and let him know how things are going.
Back downstairs we start shopping and it sure didn't take long to get a shopping cart full.
Believe me this was just the beginning of many, many more shoppping days ahead.
As we get unpacked at our new HOME we make due with what we have. We pump up the air mattresses later in the evening as we get ready for bed. The single air mattress was mine, but was elsewhere at the time of the fire and the queen size mattress Carl had picked up from my sister Ruth's house a few weeks prior to the fire.
It was another tiring day and eating take out food as we needed it.
Sleep came quiet easily, but with many thoughts going through my mind again. At the same time thankful for the help that we got that day. The Lord provides & protects. Good night.
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