Another 15 Minutes or So

OK I only have about 15 minutes because I need to go and wrap Judah's birthday presents for tomorrow but I just wanted to share a funny family story with y'all.

A few weeks ago we had another family first...first call to the fire dept. LOL
This was not a call placed "accidently on purpose" by one of our sweet children it was placed by my husband --because the chimmney was on fire. :):)

I have pictures of this but I cannot show them because my computer crashed and I have to use Michael's until I get mine fixed. Anyway...

The day it happened it was about 5:00pm and I was taking a nap. I was EXHAUSTED that day and so I napped in the living room while the children played/yelled around me. Obviously it wasn't a very deep sleeping experience but it was OK.

So there I was lightly sleeping away in the living room when I heard Thomas yelling (from the basement) at Gideon to "GO BACK UPSTAIRS CUZ THERE'S A FIRE!! " I didn't think too much about that comment because I knew that Michael had gotten home from the route, was probably packing the wood stove and THomas was trying to make sure Gid didn't go near it. Common thing.

All of a sudden there was Michael thundering up the stairs with Thomas and Gideon behind him. I opened my sleepy eyes and asked what was wrong. He looked upset and said, "I think the chimney is on fire."
My first response was, "Are you just messing with me?"
He gave me a withering look and jerked the door open to go look from the outside. I looked out the window and it looked like the normal amount of smoke that follows us packing the stove. When he opened the door to come in I noticed there was a horrible smell though. Not good.
I asked him if he was going to call 911. He said he was going to try one of our friends first to see if they knew how to put it out without having to bother the fire dept. It was just a small chimney fire.
I called my dad (cuz Daddies know EVERYTHING) and calmly asked what to do if your chimney was on fire. My dad got a bit flustered and asked, "IS your chimney on fire?" (apparently he was confused because I sounded so calm) I was like ."Yeeees." :):) HE told me a couple of things to try but we had already tried them. Michael asked him if he could put something over the top of the chimney to snuff it out. My dad said to try it since fires need oxygen. We tried it. It didn't work. We looked up the non-emergency number to the fire station but you had to leave a message and we didn't want to wait that long- obviously.

By this time Judah was a little nervous but was adorably spouting his homeschool fire safety knowledge. "Mommy we need to check and see if the doors are hot before we open them. We need to crawl if there is smoke." etc. etc.

I was thinking, "Now how am i going to get dinner ready? We can't eat out because we just ate out the other day and we don't have money to eat out again tonight."

Michael was trying to get the fire out without having to call 911.

Finally he did place a call to 911. HE told me that the operator was VERY impatient and NOT the least bit compassionate. Here's how the call went...

Operator- 911 what's your emergency?

Michael- I think my chimney is on fire. Can you put me through to a non emergency number of the fire dept?

O- I'm not authorized to give out that number. Is this an emergency?

M- explained that we just wanted to try to get it out ourselves without having the fire dept go to all the trouble of bringing a truck out here for nothing.

O- (said completely without compassion) Well I can't tell you how to put it out, and I can't give you the number; so I can't help you. Do you want me to call the fire dept as an emergency?

M- Not yet, we'll call you back.
click

About 10 minutes later we called 911 for real and got the children out of the house. I let them each grab a stuffed animal ;although Judah informed me- "You're NOT supposed to stop and grab anything. You're supposed to get out!!" (Darn it! Who taught him fire safety anyway?!)
I told him that since the actual house wasn't on fire that it would be ok. I grabbed my digital camera and my Bible, oh and a box of Godlfish crackers. The boys grabbed an animal and their Awana books and we went outside away from the house.

We heard the siren in the distance and I got a pic of them as they came up to our house.
They got out, went inside the house to check things, said it was no big deal and told us just to let it burn itself out. They were extremely nice about it. They didn't make Michael feel stupid which was helpful. I did get to meet a few of our neighbors that way. Note to self- a good way to meeet neighbors in the country is to set your chimney on fire. :):):)

We went back in about 20 minutes later and I was making a quick dinner when Michael came up from the basement looking nervous.
When I asked what was wrong he told me that the stove pipe was now red hot. NOT GOOD.
I kept making dinner and he went to take a shower.
It was fine later. Nothing bad happened.

But it sure does make for an entertaining story!

Blessings!- Angela :)