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	<h2 class="title u-padding">Houston Family Takes in 11 People, 6 Dogs and a Cat Displaced by Hurricane Harvey: &#8216;We Didn&#8217;t Even Hesitate&#8217;</h2>
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		<p class="article-header__byline">By <a href="http://people.com/author/diane-herbst/" aria-label="Posts by Diane Herbst" class="author url fn" rel="author">Diane Herbst</a><span class="article-header__bullet channel__color--color">&bull;</span><a href="https://twitter.com/DianeHerbst" target="_blank">@DianeHerbst</a></p><p class="article-header__timestamp">Posted on <time datetime="2017-08-31T14:41:14+00:00">August 31, 2017 at 2:41pm EST</time></p>	</div>
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		<amp-brightcove data-account="416418724" data-player="default" data-video-id="5559777490001" class="video" layout="responsive" width="16" height="9"></amp-brightcove><!-- End of Brightcove Player --><p class="p1"><span class="s1">To Nicole Richert, her big, dry Houston house in the midst of Hurricane Harvey meant one thing: opening her door to stranded strangers at a local Shell gas station.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">On Monday, the 41-year-old children’s pastor at Fairfield Baptist Church ferried 11 people, 6 dogs and a cat to her spacious five-bedroom home (with four bathrooms).</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“We were willing to put people wherever,” says Richert, a married mom of three sons (including one, Riley, just drafted as a pitcher by the Los Angeles Dodgers).</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">“I wasn’t even a little bit nervous about having strangers come and stay,” she says. “It was ‘see a need, meet a need.’ We didn’t even hesitate.”</span></p>
<noscript></noscript><figure id="attachment_5897242" class="wp-caption alignnone"><amp-img alt="" class="image--should-lazyload  amp-wp-enforced-sizes" src="https://peopledotcom.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/nicole-richert-4.jpg?w=2000" height="1305" width="2000" sizes="(min-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw"></amp-img><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-credit">Courtesy Nicole Richert</figcaption></figure><p class="p1"><span class="s1">That cold and rainy day, Richert was pulling into the Shell station when her aunt called and said a friend of a friend of a friend was stuck at a gas station. It was the one Richert had pulled into.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“All she knew was that her name was Judy and she was with her husband and a neighbor,” says Richert. “So I walked around the gas station saying, ‘Does anyone know a Judy?’ “</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">Richert found Judy, her husband and their neighbor, Patsy Rae Creighton, a 64-year-old grandmother, and took them to her home.</span></p>
<noscript></noscript><figure id="attachment_5897243" class="wp-caption alignnone"><amp-img alt="" class="image--should-lazyload  amp-wp-enforced-sizes" src="https://peopledotcom.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/nicole-richert-5.jpg?w=2000" height="1590" width="2000" sizes="(min-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw"></amp-img><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-custom">From left: Nicole, Patsy Rae Creighton, Justin Avalos and Cynthia Avalos</figcaption><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-credit">Courtesy Nicole Richert</figcaption></figure><p class="p1"><span class="s1">Richert and her family would come back again and again until every one of the dozen or so people displaced by the storm were either in her home or found a place to go.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">This includes Cynthia Avalos, 39, her husband and their 15-year-old son, Justin. They arrived with their six dogs (including three dachshund puppies) via a tractor that took them from waist-high flood waters gushing through their home.</span></p>
<noscript></noscript><figure id="attachment_5897241" class="wp-caption alignnone"><amp-img alt="" class="image--should-lazyload  amp-wp-enforced-sizes" src="https://peopledotcom.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/nicole-richert-3.jpg?w=1376" height="2000" width="1376" sizes="(min-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw"></amp-img><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-credit">Courtesy Nicole Richert</figcaption></figure><div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">As the family stood at the Shell station, “I wondered where are we going to end up? What will happen to us?” Avalos recalls.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“And someone comes up to us and says, ‘Do you want to come with us?’ I was like ‘Really? You only see three dogs and I have three more,’ and they said, ‘We don’t care. We have plenty of space.’ “</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">At the Richerts’ house that night, Nicole served up a dinner of cornbread and chili.</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">In the days that followed, the group has shared many more meals and prayers, long talks and news-watching sessions.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“It’s unexplainable,” says Creighton, “we are all kindred, like a little blended family.”</span></p>
<noscript></noscript><figure id="attachment_5897240" class="wp-caption alignnone"><amp-img alt="" class="image--should-lazyload  amp-wp-enforced-sizes" src="https://peopledotcom.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/nicole-richert-2.jpg?w=1460" height="2000" width="1460" sizes="(min-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw"></amp-img><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-custom">Justin Avalos</figcaption><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-credit">Courtesy Nicole Richert</figcaption></figure><p class="p1"><span class="s1">Creighton, who retired from the Army after an almost 33-year career, recently moved to Houston to be close to her son and grandchildren.</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">She fled her flooded home on Sunday to her neighbors’ house and doesn’t yet know the extent of its damage.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Richert has told Creighton he can stay as long as likes.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Nicole is amazing,” says Creighton, crying. “You don’t see people like that, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like her.</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Her spirit is so genuine; if this is how angels are, she must be one. She is a godsend.”</span></p>
<noscript></noscript><figure id="attachment_5897239" class="wp-caption alignnone"><amp-img alt="" class="image--should-lazyload  amp-wp-enforced-sizes" src="https://peopledotcom.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/nicole-richert-1.jpg?w=1706" height="2000" width="1706" sizes="(min-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw"></amp-img><figcaption class="wp-caption-text wp-caption-credit">Courtesy Nicole Richert</figcaption></figure><p class="p1"><span class="s1">Adds Avalos: “She makes everything seem easier. Who opens their house to total strangers with six dogs? I have no words for it.”</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Richert, meanwhile, doesn’t think what she and her family are doing is such a big deal.</span></p>
<div class="amp-ad-container"><amp-ad width="300" height="250" type="doubleclick" data-slot="/8484/peo/amp"></amp-ad></div><p class="p1"><span class="s1">“I don’t feel I am giving anything,” she says. “It makes my life a bit more rich.”</span></p>
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