MaldoRocks!

On Wednesday evening, October 24, at about 6:00, we (the whole family and Ashleigh, but not Michael) were in the living room, finishing homework, when Christian went downstairs to get ready to go to young men's and smelled smoke. He almost ignored it, but decided to investigate and found a small fire in our utility closet. He called to me and I went running down to see that it was in the corner, not near our water heater or furnace. It was about two feet high and I kind of panicked and pulled a mop that was on fire out of the closet so that I could smother it. Our mop handle is made of metal with a plastic coating and the only thing I had quickly accessible was a bag of vacuum cleaner bags. When I tried to smother it with them, the melted plastic from the mop splashed on my hand. I realized that wasn't such a good idea, so I stepped back and looked at the quickly growing fire and immediately something inside the closet exploded. I believe it was an aerosol can of insect repellant.

By now, the fire was about 5 feet high and I was thinking that if we didn't extinguish it quickly, we would have to evacuate. Just then, Jonathon handed Nathaniel our fire extinguisher, who handed it to me. I had some trouble locating the pin and just started pulling everything off of the nozzle area that would come off. It only took seconds (it felt like minutes) and I was able to put the fire out. From the time that Christian found the fire to the time that it was out was about 30 seconds.

I think we were all in shock - I know I was certainly not thinking clearly - when Jonathon suggested that we go outside. The house was filled with smoke and a burning plastic smell, and a fog of chemicals from the fire extinguisher. We all went out to sit on the front lawn and left the door open to air out the house and I called Michael. After he checked to be sure that we were all okay, he said that nobody was going to mutual or activity days that night. Christian and I went back inside and opened all the windows in the house and went back outside for another 5 minutes. By then, the house was pretty much aired out and we were able to start thinking rationally. Michael got home pretty soon after that with some pizza for dinner. We ate and then he and the oldest boys cleaned up the family room, which had a fine powder on absolutely everything!

Michael looked up online what to do about hand burns and decided that I fit the criteria for going to the emergency room since the burns were big enough and they were on my hand. So we headed to the ER once everything had settled down and Whitney had picked up Ashleigh. By then it was getting kind of late, so it wasn't very busy in the ER. I guess the nurses were kind of bored because once I had told my nurse that we had a small fire plus an small explosion, I had quite a few people around me checking me out. I told the doctor that my hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes were singed, and he added that my nose hairs were too! Lovely.

Once everything had settled down, the nurse gave me a Percocet for the pain since she had to clean off all the melted plastic from my hand. It didn't hurt too bad until the very end. There was some quite stubborn plastic still on my hand that she had to really scrub to remove. All in all, she was very gentle and really nice. I felt fine until we were heading home in the car. Not only did my hand start hurting, but I started feeling a little loopy. I think that Percocet is the strongest medicine I've ever taken.

The next day, I went to my hairstylist and got my hair cut so that it wouldn't look so weird. She did a great job with it as usual. The only parts of my hair that got singed were my bangs and the sides in the front. When I got my hair cut, the singed areas by my bangs were about a quarter inch long and they are now about 2 1/2 inches long.

For a few days, I felt like I had a sunburn on my face. Mostly just under my nose, my lips, and my forehead.

I wasn't thinking at all about pictures, so I didn't get any pictures of the closet, the family room or my hair. Whitney came over the next day and took a picture of my hand. She helped me re-bandage my hand since I had to change the dressing every day and it was difficult to do by myself.

I had to go to the burn center on Friday and have them check it out. They gave me some cool, stretchy, loosely-knit sleeves that I could cut a hole for my thumb and it held all the dressings on. The doctor cut all the blisters so that I wouldn't pop them at the wrong time. It was a lot easier to do things because I wasn't worried about popping them anymore. My hand only seemed to bother me when I got it around anything hot.

I had called my mom that night (she was in Washington visiting my sister) because I knew that she would want to hear about it right away and from me. She then called my visiting teacher and she arranged some meals to be brought to us. I was a little embarrassed at first because I felt like we were okay and that if I didn't cook, the kids could - I always worry about causing other people more work that are already busy with their own lives. But as I thought about it, I realized that it was good for my children to get some service and be appreciative of that and I know that the Lord would bless those that help us. I was especially grateful for the meals the next week when I actually did cook and realized how uncomfortable and difficult it was. We also heated up some of the leftovers while our power was out after Hurricane Sandy.

My hand healed pretty quickly and was pretty much back to normal in a little over two weeks. This is what it looked like 12 days after the fire.

Within a few days all the scabs and dead skin had fallen off and you couldn't even tell that I had been burned.

I feel that we were so blessed throughout this experience and I think it has increased our faith that God is watching over us. Here are some examples:

1. If the fire had started 30 minutes later, we would've been gone.
2. Christian followed a prompting from the Spirit to find out where the smoke smell was coming from.
3. Jonathon felt prompted to get the fire extinguisher even before Christian found the fire, so he was quick to go and get it.
4. The fire was well away from the water heater and furnace.
5. I stepped back from the fire (I was about 2 feet from it at first and after I stepped back I was about 5 feet from it) just before the can exploded.
6. All of the children protected by the closet wall from the explosion.
7. None of us got smoke inhalation.
8. I healed very quickly and have no scars.
9. Someone gave us a set of fire extinguishers for our wedding and this is the first time I've had to use them.