I mentioned in a previous post that our fabric Christmas Bell has survived the fire. It was stored in a narrow cabinet space above the handicapped bathroom. This storage area was created specifically by Jim F to store the bell and keep it safe. Well little did Jim know just how well this protection would work.
When I got to the church on Friday I noticed that the crew was entrenched in removing the bathroom walls and that the storage area was no more. I asked Geoff of Belfor what was left of the bell figuring it would be little more than charred fabric and melted PVC. To my shock he told me that his workers moved it to the sanctuary. And sure enough, there it was. The cover looked a bit gray but after opening the edge I found the bell to be in perfect condition, albeit smokey.
Yesterday I was able to open it up completely, remove the PVC and bring the cover and fabric home for washing. The green fabric washed beautifully and only needs ironing (and I’m putting that off!), The cover though was very gray on the bottom and one laundering did not cut it. Soaked it the tub with Oxiclean for a while and rewashed it and now it is much better. I am going to give it to Belfor for “desmokeafying”.
As I was spreading the cover out for it to completely dry, I found 2 spots where it actually had burn marks. We need to look for little miracles, now more than ever with the fire and the larger issue of the virus, I will found this as one of the small ones.
