Thank God for Home Depot

About two months ago, our refrigerator line broke and our house flooded.  Since then, we have been on an exciting and educational journey.  It started when a friend suggested we call the insurance company to help us with cleanup.  Immediately we were plunged into a world of fans and de-humidifiers.
Next we watched cleanup crews remove our parquet floors.  Adam and Paul put on work gloves and safety glasses and grabbed crow-bars and hammers and helped out.
We moved everything from the parquet floors but then had to move it back so we could remove the carpet in the living room.  Under the carpet was hideous linoleum.  We borrowed a tool and slowly chipped away at that until a neighbor informed us of a power tool that could do the job quicker.  So last weekend Adam took the kids camping and returned to finish the job of ripping up linoleum. 
Under the linoleum was black gunk.  I thought it was mildew, but we have been advised by several professionals that it is actually glue containing asbestos.  Yesterday a floor professional informed me that our neighborhood is famous for using asbestos in the glue.  I was initially paranoid about this, but everyone says that if we leave it alone, we'll all be fine.  The new flooring will be laid on top of it, so supposedly there's not a health hazard, unless we start trying to sand the asbestos.
In the kitchen we had vinyl squares, which we have also removed.  These came up easily.  Once these were removed, I thought we had mildew stains on the slab.  Nope, that's asbestos again.  Today I am going to mop the floors with bleach to kill any germs on them, but will leave the asbestos alone.
Yesterday Adam took our lower kitchen cabinets off the wall.  This involved disconnecting and reconnecting the sink, the garbage disposal, and the hot water tap.  Much sawing took place, but he was able to successfully remove the cabinets and then push them back against the wall so I can use them until the new ones are installed.
Currently our house is an obstacle course of cardboard boxes and furniture.  Our new cabinets were delivered yesterday, so the living room has all the normal furniture, plus cardboard boxes, plus 13 new cabinets and accessories.
Besides the bedrooms, where we'll keep our carpet, our flooring is currently concrete slab.
Through this whole process, we have been so grateful for the help we receive.
When the house flooded, our neighbors provided help and equipment to dry out the house.  The insurance company sent us professional to the  house to take care of it.  We had no idea about de-humidifiers or moisture sensors.  The restoration people educated us and took care of the job.  Then the insurance company sent out an adjuster, who wrote Adam a check to pay for repairs.
Adam called several contractors to bid on our repairs, but we just didn't know anything about this process, so ended up choosing Home Depot both for price and for customer service.  We walked into Home Depot at 5:30 p.m. on a Sunday night and said we wanted wood floor.  The employee working in the flooring department was kind enough to walk us through:  Wood or laminate?  Snap on or Glue down?  American wood or Chinese?  Eco-friendly or not?  Hand-scraped or other?  What color?  What about tile that looks like wood?
Later, Adam arrived in the cabinet department and told our new friend Frank that we needed cabinets.  Turns out that was like walking into flooring and saying "I want wood."  Thousands of options to solve our problem.  This particular part of the process has been the longest.  Adam has been eating lunch every day at the little food truck outside Home Depot.  Omar tries to save Adam chicken fajitas every day, but sometimes Adam has to settle for a hot dog.  Every week day, Adam takes up pictures of our kitchen and talks to Frank about what we need and how to get it done.  One day I went to see Frank to finalize cosmetic decisions about the kitchen.  New drawer handles and knobs.  Which faucet?  New sink or our old one?  New garbage disposal?  What color counter top?
I think the Home Depot employees should have name tags that say either "Ambassador" or "Tour Guide" because all of these decisions are like entering a foreign world.  Color of grout?  Who knew there was an entire palette of grout colors?  We spent about 30 seconds on that decision.
We are so grateful for each and every employee at Home Depot that has helped us.  None have laughed at our ignorance and all have provided essential information and patience.  I think we have at least another month before this is mostly done, but at least we have friendly tour guides to lead us through this mystifying world of home improvement.