VOLUNTOWN, Conn. -- When Carol Girard was asked what style house she might like from the ABC television show "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," she mentioned a colonial, a farmhouse or perhaps a Victorian.
What she got was a castle.
"It was truly an unbelievable moment," Girard says about first seeing her new home. "I remember looking around because there were no more trees where we had trees, and my driveway wasn't where it was supposed to be. And instead I had a castle in front of me." Sitting in the comfortable great room of her new home, Girard talks easily about the "Extreme Makeover" experience and adjusting from a life of near homelessness to one living in a 3,200-square-foot castle fit for, well, a queen.
There's a gourmet kitchen with a six-burner stove, a steam shower in the master bathroom, plasma TVs and, most important, a safe (and elaborately themed) resting place for each of her four children.
"I won the lottery; that's what this is," Girard says. "I do find myself crying a little bit more than I have been because there has been so much going on, and I told my husband everything. I can tell his picture now, but it's certainly not the same." The Girard family -- including youngsters Adam, 17, Jacqueline, 15, Lucas, 12, and Hannah, 8 -- was chosen to receive a new home, built by the "Extreme Makeover" team in December, after suffering heartbreaking losses.
More than a year ago, their house burned down while the family was working at a lobster dinner fund-raiser. Then, last summer, Carol's husband, Thomas Girard, drowned while swimming in a local lake. Their 18-year-old son, Marc, who was studying to become a priest, also drowned trying to save his father.
Homeless, the family moved in with a relative.
Although Girard says the new home is an unbelievable gift, it doesn't provide the closure everyone keeps telling her will come with this new beginning. "We need to get on with our life, that's true, but it's not closure because you can't close your heart, and we will always have Thom and Marc in our hearts," she says.
Girard's new home has become a local tourist attraction in Voluntown, near the Connecticut-Rhode Island border, with cars slowing down daily on Preston City Road to gaze at the castle.
The heart of the home is the "great room." This two-story space, in the center of the house, is dominated by floor-to-ceiling windows facing the rear of the property, and by a soaring stone fireplace flanked on each side by built-in bookshelves.
The Girards have added their own touches, removing some decorations provided by the show's designers and adding their own.
"Otherwise, it felt a little like we were living in a hotel," Girard says.
The mantel above the fireplace is made from a piece of chestnut saved from the family's old home. Above the mantel is a shield that belonged to Thom -- father and son Marc were members of the Knights of Lepanto, a Catholic organization that emphasizes respect and community service.
Girard says it was an odd experience giving up total control of what eventually became her home. Although producers asked her and the kids their favorite colors and styles and tastes, the family had no say over the final product.
"I would never put the Earth tones with the greens, the blues and reds," Girard says of the many colors used on the first floor. "But it works. I think they did a great job."
Jacqueline Girard says she's pleased with her bedroom, which emphasizes her love of photography. "Thank you' is such an overused word," she says, "but I can't think of what else to say to everyone for this home. Thank you."
Hannah received a snowflake room (her dad called her "My little snowflake"), Adam a train room and Lucas a knight's room complete with a hand-made round table.
"The moment we opened the door, we felt their presence here," Jacqueline Girard says of her father and oldest brother. "They inspired this building."
Carol Girard is looking forward to some normalcy in her family's lives, now that they have a home and the attention from "Extreme Makeover" begins to fade.
"We will still have some sorrowful tears," she says. "But my kids don't have to be afraid of what's to come anymore. I don't think our life is going to have tragedy written all over it anymore."
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