Damage Assessment #1

We made it to DFW safely on Thursday and have been enjoying some extra time with Jason's folks and brother's family. Our dear friends, Jeremy and Daesha, weathered the storm and gave us initial damage reports on Sunday. Jason left DFW on Friday morning to go to San Antonio as part of the catastrophy team for the insurance company that he works for. Today he was sent to Houston to assess the damage to their insureds and he was able to go inside our house and look around. I always try to look on the bright side and count my blessings, so I will try to remember our abundant blessings as I tell you about our damage due to Ike.

1. We are blessed that the pine tree out front did not fall into our living room.
2. We are blessed that there is only one hole in our roof.
3. We are blessed that the hole is about a 1 1/2 foot square where the twirly vent used to be. The twirly vent is currently in our front yard.
4. We are blessed that a lot of shingles are off the roof and we get the new roof that we have needed since we bought the house 5 years ago.
5. We are blessed because 2 of our fences are laying on the ground, but did not fly off and break any windows.
6. We are blessed that the third fence is only leaning and did no damage.
7. We are blessed because the kitchen, den, dining room, nursery, teacher room and guest room had NO damage, even though some of the boards were blown off the windows.
8. We are blessed that the ceiling collasped only in our bedroom - destroying our mattress, bedding, night stand and bookshelf.
9. We are blessed that we left our house because the ceiling could have fallen on us while sleeping and that would have been terrible.
10. We are thankful that the pictures were all off the walls and that we took all the scrapbooks with us because the destroyed bookshelves used to be the home for them.
11. We are blessed that we have in-laws that love us and are the epitome of hospitable to our displaced family.
12. We are blessed that mom and dad only sustained broken limbs and plant debris.
13. We are blessed that Granny and Popa's house only has a fence down.
14. We are blessed that the church building had NO damage, even when the funeral home next door burned to the ground.
15. We are blessed that our loving God protected our family and friends during the storm. God is so wonderful!

I'll post pics once Jason emails them to me of the inside of our house. Check out Daesha's blog for pics before and after the storm of her house, ours and others from church. Her name is in my sidebar. I'm emotionally spent and exhasted. Thank you blog world for your prayers. They have been answered and we feel so blessed that in the big picture, our damage was very small.