Last words of mom and wife come true

The show's air date will be announced later.
By DENISE DICK
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
BOARDMAN -- The last thing Jackie Novak said to her husband, Jeff, was that she was going to do something to get the family on ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition."
"Jackie and Jeff were big fans of the show," said Jeff Mamula, whose girlfriend, Gerry Morley, is Jackie's mother. "They'd always tease that they were going to do something to get on the show."
The show's producers pick a deserving family, demolish their home and build a new one with services and materials donated by local and national companies.
The couple was watching the show May 8, Mother's Day, just a few weeks after the birth of their third daughter, Presley. Feeling tired, Jackie went to bed early that night, Mamula said.
"She was halfway up the stairs and the last thing that she said to him was that she was going to get them on the show," Mamula said.
She died that night
Jackie, 28, died of a pulmonary embolism, or a blood clot on the lung, that night, leaving Jeff, 29, to raise their three daughters, Presley, Zoey, 6, and Harley, 2, as a single parent.
Novak is a teacher in the South Range School District, and his wife was a Jackson-Milton schoolteacher.
On Wednesday, Jackie's dream started to take shape when a crew from the popular Sunday show descended on the family's Arlene Avenue home.
"G-o-o-o-o-d morning Novak family," star Ty Pennington yelled through his trademark megaphone. "Jeff, Zoey, Harley and Presley, wake up!"
A crowd of about 200 family members, friends and neighbors gathered across the street to watch the action. Members of the production crew hushed the onlookers, trying to ensure the family's surprise.
Novak, his daughters and mother-in-law emerged from the house, with Zoey in the lead, to greet Pennington and his crew. Morley threw her arms around Pennington's neck. After a conversation and a few more hugs exchanged between family and crew, they went back inside to tour the house.
On vacation
The family was whisked away for a vacation in Daytona Beach, Fla., while the work is being done.
TC Quality Homes of Canfield is working with the show to tear down the family's 76-year-old three-bedroom home, which is prone to basement flooding, and build them a new one. Demolition is to start Friday morning, and on Oct. 19, when the Novak family returns, they'll have a new house, according to a news release from Prodigal Media of Poland.
A date for the show's broadcast hasn't been set, though it's expected later this year.
Mamula said that Zoey, the couple's oldest daughter, wrote a letter to the show after her mother's death.
"She said: 'I lost my mommy. My daddy lost his wife and my sisters and I could use a new house,'" he said.
The family completed the required audition tape and sent it to the show. Zoey, who Mamula says loves Pennington, included her impersonation of the star, using a cup for her megaphone.
The family learned about three months ago that they were in the running to be selected, but it wasn't official until the bus pulled in front of the house Wednesday morning and Pennington performed his wake-up call.
Joseph Gonzalez, who lives across the street, said the Novaks would "give the shirts off their backs to help anybody."
His family met the Novaks for the first time when the couple showed up, buckets in hand, to help their neighbors clean up the water from their home from the heavy rains of two years ago.
"Ever since then, we've been helping each other out," Gonzalez said.
He described Jackie as "the leader of the pack."
"She always took care of the kids and took care of her husband," the neighbor said.
And she was funny. Jeff, on the other hand, is quiet and a bit shy, he said.
Neighbors help
The production crew approached neighbors asking for use of their yards during construction. Those whose yards are used will be paid $500 by the show.
Mamula believes Jackie would be thrilled.
"Right now, she's jumping up and down," he said.