John Donovan's alarm clock had just gone off at 7:00 a.m. Friday morning. 

He was just about to reset it and grab some extra sleep when banging erupted on his front door. "I heard the banging, and then yelling," Donovan says, "and I went to the door and said 'Who's there?' and then the lady started yelling, 'Get your family out! Get your family out!' I looked at the house next door and it was just . . . just flames, everywhere."

Donovan and his wife are parents to seven children - only six were home at the time. He hurried to wake everyone, and they rushed out of their Pritchard Avenue home with what they had on. "My one boy was only in shorts and boots. I took off my sweater and wrapped it around him." Donovan says an act of Providence was the garbage collectors were just going by, and they put the children in the cab of the truck to keep them warm. "I'm thankful for God watching out over us; that those guys were there in that truck."

He's thankful too that his alarm had just gone off, "and for that neighbour. The timing, with me just about to hit snooze, it was all just . . . I'm grateful to God and how it all worked out." 

Despite the loss and the uncertainty Donovan, who attends Wide World of Faith Church in Winnipeg knows that God was at work. "The events - the way it happened, it just had to be God led or something. The way it happened . . . it wasn't by chance."

Donovan and his family now are left to wait and wonder how bad the damage is to their house as the flames spread from his neighbour's house to his. "The fire chief had said there's going to be extensive smoke damage and a lot of water damage. My windows were all busted out as well . . . we don't know what's going to happen until the smoke settles . . . we just don't know." Donovan hoped to go in the house today but the fire chief told him there is eight inches of ice surrounding the home.