Carolyn was continuing work in the virtual world Second Life by building the two virtual "islands" for the university and creating educational content for them. She built the islands of Biome and Biome II in a group of educational areas called Scilands. In addition she has worked with Mary Ann Clark, a colleague from Texas Wesleyan University, to do research on the use of virtual worlds in education.
Around the middle of March, the friend who was watching the house called and told us our roof was leaking and that he would have some people come over and shovel off the snow. A few days later one of the young men who was shoveling the roof called and told us we had a bigger problem than we knew. We called our daughter, Jennifer, and asked her to check on it. She went by, called us and said "where's the water shut off?" She sent us some snapshots that
showed huge trashcans filled with water in the kitchen. We knew we were in trouble. At that time our thought was that a pipe
had frozen. We called the insurance company and arranged for Jennifer to meet with the adjuster. At that point we knew that the kitchen was completely destroyed and that there was a lot of damage in the basement. We still didn't have a good idea of what had really happened. The insurance adjuster said he would get a clean-up company (Service Master out of Iron Mountain - we DO NOT recommend them) to come in and get it ready for repairs. Jennifer, who was working for the UP Builders Association, recommended a very good contracting company, IHS, to do the reconstruction. We decided to stay a bit longer in Oklahoma so that the work would be done when we got home.
Meanwhile back at the ranch (Oklahoma) Carolyn broke her toe in a very painful way, there
were several trips to the hospital with various family members, but lots of fun with family and her niece's wedding in Texas.
Jennifer became engaged to Jay Phillips and scheduled a wedding for late April. We left Oklahoma with an assurance from the insurance company that, while all the construction wasn't completed, we could move back into the house and that it had been cleaned by the clean-up company.
We arrived home about 2am on the day before Jennifer's wedding to find that there was a huge pod (like a truck trailer) parked in the middle of our very long country driveway so we had to trek through the foot of snow (yes snow at the end of April - it's the UP) in sandals up to the house. We walked in and couldn't believe the house. We could barely breathe for the mold in the air. The place was filthy, half the cabinets were taken out - the others weren't, nothing had been done in the basement or the upstairs bathroom. We also learned that it was not a frozen pipe - it was an inside pipe in the wall by the upstairs shower. Basically it ran like a bathtub for a week then everything molded. We couldn't stay that way so we went to a hotel and also got a room for Lisa since she was coming in for the wedding.
Jennifer and Jay had a beautiful, small, family-oriented wedding at the indoor pavilion on Presque Isle in Marquette. They looked blissfully happy. Lisa was able to make it to be Jennifer's matron of honor.
We informed the insurance company that we had moved to a hotel and they moved us to the Ramada Inn in downtown Marquette. We had to fight to get a different clean-up company to come in and finally won that battle. They (SCI of Marquette) were remarkable. We DO recommend them - highly. They took out walls, subflooring, cabi
nets - everything that had been wet or molded. We found at this time that Service Master, who had rented the pod, had not put anything in it but the insurance company was paying for it. We ended up living in the Ramada Inn for 20 weeks and 2 days. We finally got home in the middle of September - after school started. On a good note - we survived a small room with 2 double beds, a dog, a cat and a bird for 20 weeks without killing each other or even screaming. I think we have a solid marriage. Below is our one-bed organization system for our "home away from home".
During the summer, Carolyn taught an online graduate course. Jennifer and Jay moved to California - good for them, not so good for us - we miss Jennifer.
We have a completely new kitchen (as you can see by the before and after picture below) and upstairs bathroom as well as all new flooring in the basement. At the same time, they repaired the roof so we have a better insulated home with no roof leaks (it turns out that there was a leak from the roof although that wasn't the main problem).
Soon after moving home Kevin made a trip to Oregon for some family business and then on November 12 he had sinus, nose and ear surgery. The surgery has not gone well so now, two days before Christmas - he is still recovering.
On a very bright side, In November we also had a new grandbaby born to Curt and Mandy. Maya Julia Deason was born healthy and with fat little cheeks and lots of black hair on November 9.
Carolyn is in Oklahoma with the family while Kevin is home alone (Hopefully it won't turn out like the movie).
So ends a year we hope never to repeat although it could have been much worse.
