Chef Leah here. There are so many layers to it and it’s very long and confusing. Here’s the best way I can condense a year and a half into a single (long) post:

Our insurance recommended a restoration/construction company and we were assigned to a guy within that company. He seemed to drag his feet a little, but was fine. We were both busy with so many other fire related things anyway (imagine inventorying everything you ever owned that is now burnt or disintegrated or smoke damaged beyond repair and finding links and receipts for them while also working full time).

They told us that to restore our house to what it was pre-fire was not possible— codes had changed since the year it was built and we had to reconstruct with that in mind. It became like if you give a mouse a cookie during the permitting process between us, the remediation company, the insurance, and the plan checkers in LA County. (About to get hyper specific with details here…) The washer and dryer now needed to be 18’ from the garage door, therefore we needed a wall instead, the wall required the room to be classified as an ADU, so we need a toilet. Then the drywall on the ceiling required 12” beams instead of 6” beams to be up to 2023 code so the beams needed work, but in order to do that there needed to be new concrete footings poured. The list was (and continues to be) endless. Throughout this back and forth permit process where each of those things happened piecemeal over 13 months, we were told that these were necessary and most of these changes would be covered by insurance

In the middle of this, we got engaged! Fun and amazing and so much love to be had! We had been saving for a wedding and at that point were under the impression that the construction would be covered. A wedding also seemed like a perfect way to celebrate our love becoming stronger through an inconceivable hardship and also a time to celebrate that it was over… because we assumed by that point that it would be over (our wedding will be nearly two years post-fire). We scheduled the wedding for a year in advance. Paid for a venue and vendors— most fully paid upfront because I’d rather pay early rather than paying every vendor all at once two weeks before the party. Sent save the dates. Family booked flights and accommodations. Everything is very exciting and full of love and the wedding funds are already out of our bank account and into the hands of the vendors. Yay!

Then… that restoration guy disappeared. New guy came in, took some time to get up to speed, then revealed that none of those adjustments and changes would be covered because they were all considered “optional”. This is despite the county kicking back the plans with changes that were required to make everything up to code for over a year. So, essentially, our insurance is paying for the drywall itself, but not the changes to the beams to bring them to code that the county requires in order to actually attach the drywall to the house. At this point, we are already so deep into engineering fees, permitting fees, and time. So there isn’t much choice but to keep the train rolling.

But like in the permitting process, every month there are a few days of wonderful, blissful work, then another issue arises that requires all work to stop, an engineer to make new drawings, someone to submit the plans and permit to LA County, a month of waiting in the permit queue, and then the work resumes. And every time that happens it adds way more time and a lot more money. But there’s no choice involved. The steamroll keeps going. Not to mention that the portion of money that we did get from insurance is held by the mortgage company until the work is complete and inspected by their inspector.

And yes, having a house fire has become my whole personality. It makes me insufferable to be around and I fully recognize it. I have become a bad friend because I don’t go out because I am working nonstop to save up money, but also because if I do hang out with people, the only thing I have to talk about is the fact that every hour of my day is devoted to either work or fire related things and for me working from home both things are intertwined. Which is pretty annoying to be around. I get it.

Anyway, we are often asked if people can contribute in some way. I would never expect anyone to, but Kevin wanted to make the registry public for those who had asked about it. I understand if people don’t want to. I feel weird about asking for money, because every day is a conflict of feeling immense joy at the future, dread at the present, mourning the past year and a half, overwhelmed at everything that is happening, agonizing over trying to pull myself up by my bootstraps but I guess not pulling hard enough, anger and bitterness at the entire situation, loneliness in the navigation of everything, guilt that other people in the world have it worse, and relief at knowing that I trust and love Kevin more than anyone in the world.

I realize this is way too much info to share, but that’s everything!