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Welcome Home, Grimaldi Family!
Homeowner Bio Lorrie Grimaldi has called St. Bernard Parish home since the day she was born. Now, more than four years after Hurricane Katrina struck, Lorrie is working tirelessly with her partner of 11 years, Lance, so that their two daughters Laken (nine years old) and Lathen (seven months old) have a home to call their own.
Until the St. Bernard Project has the funds to rebuild their house, they are packed in with Lance’s family in a two-bedroom home. At first, Lorrie, Lance, and Lathen shared a bed, while Laken slept on the couch in a separate room. Lorrie recalls the night that Lance, who works for a commercial fisherman and often works irregular hours, came home to find Lorrie and the two girls all packed into one bed. “Laken woke up and started crying her eyes out,” Lorrie remembers. “We asked her what was wrong and she said, ‘When can I have a room and a bed like my friends at school! I want us to have a home, too.’”
“Lance tried to comfort her. ‘You can have this bed until you have a room of your own. Daddy will sleep on the sofa, ok?’”
“It was heartbreaking and no child should have to worry about these things.” Lorrie paused and, with a resiliency and determination that seems to be a defining characteristic of her personality, she continued, “We are going to rebuild this home for our daughters. This is going to happen.”
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Only four months before the storm, Lorrie, Lance and Laken were celebrating an incredible day for their family. After years of saving, they finally had enough money to purchase a mobile home outright. They moved in, but as Lorrie points out, “Four months later Katrina came and there went our home. Once again, we had nothing -- except each other, of course.”
The 18 months were incredibly difficult. Lorrie remembers traveling around the southeastern United States with 22 members of her extended family. When they were forced to evacuate, they went to Monroe, Louisiana and stayed on mattresses in the gym of a church for four days. A woman in Monroe was sympathetic toward the large family and invited the entire group to pack into her home for three weeks. “We were so thankful that this woman allowed us to stay with her,” Lorrie explains, “but it was also one of the most difficult times of my life. My parents fled to another family member’s house in Mississippi. I spoke with them the day of Katrina and, the last thing I heard before the phone cut out was that a tree had fallen on the house where they were staying. I didn’t hear from them for the next four weeks. I hope you never have to know what that feels like.”
The family settled with relatives in Florida for the next eight months so that Laken could find comfort and friends at a single school. Eventually, however, they could no longer ignore the desire to move back into St. Bernard Parish. Lorrie describes the return, “In St. Bernard we stayed in a FEMA trailer for the next year and a half. We tried to make the best of it, but Laken was always getting sick. We would take her to the doctor and he would say, ‘It’s probably the trailer. This is fairly common. Our home was making my little girl sick! Runny noses, hives -- red bumps all over her. She would always ask if we could go visit one of her friends’ homes. She would say, ’Mommy, I just want to be in a house for a little while and my friend said we can come over.’ It was such an innocent thing to say, but it hurt Lance and me so much.”
That’s when Lance and Lorrie purchased the piece of property they are now hoping the St. Bernard Project can help them rebuild. Lance is still working as a fisherman and Lorrie helped Lance’s father, a pastor, rebuild the Delacroix Hope Church. The church was rededicated this past August 11th and now, in addition to the time-consuming task of looking after a seven-month-old, Lorrie is helpings families rebuild their homes, assisting the church in building a home for volunteers to live, and -- with whatever time she has left --managing as much of her own home’s rebuilding as possible.
After once again saving enough to purchase their home outright, Lorrie and Lance completed the electrical work (Lance spent some time working as an electrician with his brother after the storm), had an uncle work on the plumbing, gathered leftover insulation, installed the air conditioning, found someone to donate almost all of the sheet rock, and raised enough in in-kind donations to completely tile the laundry room, kitchen and two bathrooms.
This is not a family passively waiting for someone to come to their rescue. Lance and Lorrie are hard-working and determined to give their daughters a home of their own. Four years later, we can finally end their wait.
When the St. Bernard Project informed Lorrie that we were beginning a campaign to raise the funds to rebuild her home, she could barely control her emotions. “Oh my gosh, if we can get back home for Christmas -- if my girls could be home for Christmas -- I would just cry! We would all just cry. We’d be so happy.”
House Updates
| 11/23/09
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