rerouted, redug, rehosed

the window well that won't stop flooding.

or the memorial day gift that won't stop giving:)

rerouted,

redug,

rehosed.

max wanted to know why we didn't go to the place with all of the dead people and flags in the grass?

trenches my dear.

trenches.

we think we got it this time guys.

here's to not bucketing water out of the flower beds at 1am in your robe anymore.

my neighbors almost saw me in my underpants.

the towel i wrapped around myself is still laying in the yard.

there's only so many clothes i can have on at this point,

and i'm down to underwear bottoms in the middle of the night.

i seriously considered going out there in them too.

good thing there was a towel handy last night right by the door,

cause who knows what i would have been brought to do otherwise.

THAT could have been embarrassing.

phew.

who knows why, but i love this stupid house. {part 4--the end}

Rigo came and patched up the hole in the basement ceiling,

the base guys came and made the upstairs look pretty again with their trim,

and we did all of the touch up paint on the walls and the ceiling 

that Rigo had to re-drywall and texture after the flood,

brennan slept in his basement room 

for the very first time.

with no shirt.

{every night since then he's requested no shirt. says he doesn't need one anymore. not in the cold dark basement. he literally just buries himself under the covers in crisp cold bliss. he's my hottest blooded baby. always has been. chase is a close second. max on the other hand gets purple lips if the temp drops below 70 and sunny.}

...

so i woke up that saturday morning,

the day after we repainted the ceiling that Rigo had just redrywalled and retextured,

2 weeks after the dishwasher flood, with BIG plans to sit on the bed in the kids' bedroom upstairs. andrea {aka "WILSON" had ripped out the old closest, doors included, and she and sean had spent an entire saturday and a couple of hours on sunday painting the inside of it white.

it took 4 coats. 

sean was going to build a new closet for max in what used to be the boy cowboy room,

but is now fondly referred to as "the frozen room."

it's magical girl bliss, with an Olaf side for chase whenever we decide to let him sleep in there with her.

for now, we've had plenty of changes. we don't need anymore just yet.

so sean was going to install the closet, andrea was going to build the drawers, and i was going to wash the bassinet bedding, newborn clothes,

and other things like that.

it had literally been raining for 5 days straight and i was dreaming of lolly pops and rainy day nesting inside heaven for the entire day.

but when i went down to make brennan's bed, i opened the blinds and saw inches of water in the window well.

3 and 1/2 inches to be exact.

like OH MY WORD, that's going to come in through brennan's window really soon if we don't get that water out of there fast!

this is what i was thinking.

so i punched out the screen on the window,

thanking my LUCKY STARS that i had come down to make his bed,

instead of sending him to do it like i normally do {sometimes being neurotic and wanting a perfectly made bed in a basement pays off folks. yesssssss.},

and then i was thanking my LUCKY STARS AGAIN that i opened the blinds just to see how light the room is on a rainy day down there

JUST

IN THE KNICK OF TIME

to catch what would have been a THIRD FLOOD in two weeks before it happened.

thank HEAVENS we caught this one BEFORE it happened.

so when i stuck my head out into that window well i could see right away that there was a small waterfall streaming down the left side of the window well, filling up what was becoming a small aquarium for snails and spiders with rocks. 

i ran to the other window well of the basement. dry as a bone.

that was a plus.

i ran outside to see where all of the water was coming from and right away i could see it was coming from the gutter that ran underground and away from the house off of the roof.

plugged and clogged.

fully plugged and clogged,

and spilling out, overflowing, like old faithful itself.

i shoved my hand down there to see if i could swish some leaves out of the way.

no luck.

left a message for my father in law about things of this nature,

called sean to see if he was going to be home anytime soon, and did i need to send for reinforcements, because while we didn't have a crisis just yet, one was a'brewin'.

i was so glad contractor dave was still on the job with his shop vac conveniently still in our basement. phew. also his buckets, and the plastic tarp Rigo left behind came in handy great for the second day in a row, as we also used it for painting the night before:) go us.

30 minutes later sean was home, and we were sucking 2 giant shop vacs worth of water out of the window well in brennan's room. who would have known that 3 1/2 inches of water could fill two giant shop vacs worth of water?

my mother in law said she thinks our house is cursed.

and my father in law told us that he thought we were going to have to dig out the drain pipe down a foot into the grass to unplug the clog underground.

sean and i just kept looking at each other as he ran 6 buckets of water up the basement stairs to dump off the side of the house, just saying our prayers of thanks that we found this flood before it ruined our house another time.

water. i never knew it could be so rude.

3 and a half hours later sean had dug out the flower bed and into the grass,

suctioned out mud, and opened up a clogged drain pipe end that had clearly been building up with mud and leaves for who knows how long, 

slowly keeping the drain pipe from being able to bring the water run off from the roof 

away from the house. there it's been all this time,

just waiting to flood our basement window well.

it was pouring rain the entire time.

did i mention that?

it was.

thank you thank you thank you dear lord that we painted the ceiling that Rigo the drywaller patched,

so brennan could sleep in his new room, and most of all, that i wanted to make brennan's bed 

and open the blinds down in that basement that one saturday morning last weekend.

sean gibson is my hero,

and we have officially decided that we are just ready to sell the house and go back to being renters.

that's what we said at the end of all of this which was the last 4 weeks of our life.

i have never seen sean so filthy,

with mud sprayed all over his face,

soaked to the bone,

and dripping in mud literally from head to toe.

HOT i tell you. HOT.

in other news,

THIS JUST IN!

the oven is broken.

it did this a few weeks ago.

wouldn't preheat.

cause it wouldn't turn on.

dave the contractor was here that night when it happened the first time.

he's also an electrician.

he kicked it.

banged it.

shook it.

and it worked again.

so just now,

in a panic of dinner is gonna be REALLY late tonight,

i kicked it,

banged it a few times,

yelled at it.

whined at it,

shook it for good measure,

and do you know what it did?

that precious little oven turned on:)

i sighed a big sigh of relief.

thank you little oven.

thank you.

because see, there's no money left for it to break right now!

so it just can't break right now.

renting is looking really good.

anyone want to buy a cursed house?

{ok really, i'm just kidding. because who knows why, but i love this stupid house.}

{some breathing air would be great for a minute though. just saying.}

{the end}

like Pollyanna herself couldn't have been more glad {part 3}

so we cranked the heater in the house up to NINETY.

turned on all of the fans again,

and prayed for a miracle.

i have never been so hot in my entire life.

when the flooring installers showed up i could see in their faces they didn't want to come into my home.

it was stifling hot.

STIFLING!

and not just for a pregnant lady.

so i explained to them that we had a little bit of water drip onto the floor last night and we were just trying to really get things nice and dried out,

and could they just start the flooring at the other end where they entry was?

please please please please pretty pretty please.

this is what i was thinking in my head.

they said ok,

i jumped for joy and did flips inside my head.

outside i stayed totally calm and collected.

i was soooo unbelievable cool about it.

maybe.

so then i held my breath hoping that would give the floor in the kitchen enough time to dry out before jaren came by to see the progress of the installation.

i was feeling like naked eve in the garden of eden guys.

NAKED.

cause i ate the fruit and lied about it.

we turned off the heater so the installers didn't have to die from heat exhaustion,

i shipped my little kids out to a neighbor,

and i spent the morning outside to avoid the sweat box which was my house.

my cousin jaren showed up a couple of hours later,

laughed at how i had hidden the second flood from him,

and told me it wasn't a big deal at all,

and that they could put floors down on the pretty much dried out mdf no problem.

i laughed and confessed all my sins,

and still felt a little bit sheepish.

i was desperate for flooring guys!

and not thinking clearly.

pregnant lady not thinking clearly.

who had been living in 1st world chaos for the last 72 hours.

caused by a sprinkler in a metal box in the middle of my kitchen.

so they finished off the flooring that day,

and we moved our kitchen table and refrigerator back into place,

and i felt like everything was gonna be ok again.

and also,

i was really glad that there wasn't carpet under my kitchen table anymore:)

REALLY

REALLY

REALLY

glad:)

like Pollyanna herself couldn't have been more glad kind of glad about it.

man, i just wish it wouldn't have been after we had paid to finish our entire basement.

cause that hurt a little bit.

and made it not nearly as much fun.

smack yourself in the face stupid {part 2}

to save ourselves $350 sean and his dad decided to rip up the flooring and subflooring after the kids went to bed wednesday night themselves.
who gets brand new flooring three days after a flood you ask?
a gal with family in the flooring business.
who had a cancellation in their schedule at the last minute,
and some pretty sweet flooring to pick from in the warehouse that didn't need to acclimate to a utah climate that's not georgia.
did you know that about wood?
it has to sit in your house before you install it?
because it expands and stuff.
or something.
so we threw all of our major appliances and kitchen table onto the carpet in the big room,
and everything on the floor in the pantry up onto the divider between the kitchen and the big room,
tried to put the kids to bed early,
which BY THE WAY was a total disaster.
of course.
chase wouldn't GO to bed.
might have been that 3 hour nap i let him take earlier that day,
which was such a good idea during,
but such a bad idea at 8:30pm that night.
like he climbed out of his bed about 10 times in the span of 5 minutes,
and after my big old belly couldn't lift him back in
and i didn't have any threats i was actually willing to anti-up and follow through on any more,
i yelled UNCLE!,
waved the white flag,
and brought him to the top of the stairs with me to watch the show.
then i gave him benedryl and waited for it to kick in.
sometime around 10:30pm he finally conked out.
during that time,
brennan licked max in her bed so she couldn't go to sleep,
max hit brennan because he licked her so HE couldn't go to sleep,
and so basically no one went to sleep that wednesday night,
and i was just really grateful the 4th gibson was quietly restrained inside of my belly
because lord knows i didn't handle myself very well in any shape or form.
not my finest mothering hour.
it wasn't pretty.

{would you check out that sweet vinyl the previous owners laid laminate RIGHT on top of? good riddance. never have i ever felt so happy to say goodbye to something in this house.}

{check out all of the lovely black mold that had been growing between the laminate and the vinyl for what appears to be a VERY long time. like WAY longer than before the flood.}

 {REMEMBER THIS PICTURE ABOVE. it will live in flood stupidy infamy.

particularly i want you to notice the water alarm. sitting on the counter:). the little white square box.

with the red dot on top. yeah that one. ON TOP of the counter. 

yep. cause we are JUST that smart folks.}

{sometime after midnight my father in law and i took an oreo break and he told me how these are the times in life that we will look back on and remember with fondness. we cheered to that.}

at 2am the last nail was pulled,

and all of the old laminate, vinyl, and subfloor had been hauled out to the side of the house.

we all staggered off to bed feeling so accomplished from a job well done,

and then we woke up 

the next morning to THIS:

.

.

.

.

.

what are you looking at you ask?

the intake water hose that had un-duck taped itself from the sink AND REFLOODED THE KITCHEN AND BASEMENT CEILING while we all peacefully slept.

sometime between 2am when we went to sleep and 7:30am when we woke back up.

that's when the tape unstuck.

because when we uninstalled the dishwasher we found that the original flood may in fact have just been caused a leaky hose,

that dripped even when the water valve was turned off.

imagine the damage it could have caused when it was on full blast running a dishwasher.

wait...

like maybe it could have flooded an kitchen and a brand new basement ceiling?

just a theory...

especially since the second flood showed it's pretty little face in the EXACT same place as the first flood.

well the drip drip drip did plenty the second time it flooded as well.

because when it came untaped, 

it reflooded the whole D**N floor and the basement ceiling again too.

and i just felt STUPID.

i yelled for sean who was still asleep in bed,

to GET DOWN HERE!!!!

and i'm pretty sure i swore a lot,

mostly because i kept asking myself

why didn't we put something on that hose to hold it in place if the duct tape untaped?!

i remember thinking about it the night before for about 2.5 seconds, but being too tired to really be all that worried about it.

but mostly i just felt stupid that the water alarm was none other than

ON

THE

KITCHEN

COUNTER:)

yep, mmmhmmm.

stupid.

smack yourself in the face stupid.

because that little drip drip drip did so much that all of the drying out we did to avoid cutting into the basement ceiling was basically worthless.

when my contractor dave and frank the water restoration guy cut a hole in the basement ceiling that thursday morning i cried.

and then i started having an anxiety attack about how we had flooring that was supposed to be going in two hours from now, 

you know, on top of the SUPPOSED TO BE DRIED OUT wood floor 

that was now WET AND FLOODED AGAIN,

and how my cousins said they were booked three weeks out,

and was this going to mean we were going to have to live like this with all of our major appliances in the big room, everything from the pantry on top of the go between,

and mdf WOOD floor {not the kind i had in mind} everywhere for the next 3 weeks until they had another opening???

like was i going to go into labor and still be living like this?

this is what i was thinking that morning the dishwasher hose flooded the kitchen and the basement ceiling for a second time.

yep.

that's what she said.

the story of when our dishwasher flooded our kitchen and the new basement ceiling {there's PARTS}

if you like my stories,
you're gonna love this.
cause there's PARTS.
parts guys.
PARTS:)
that's all i'm saying.
here we go...

PART 1
first,
the basement got finished.
it smelled like new carpet,
and paint.
and it was amazing.
i made the bed in brennan's new room.
it was a sunday.
i started the dishwasher that night around midnight and went to bed feeling like i could see the light at the end of the tunnel.
we were there!
and i could hardly wait to get my little nesting paws on the house.
the next morning,
sean came downstairs to do paperwork at about 5:30am
to
a
small
pond
in
the
kitchen.
when i came downstairs two hours later to get brennan ready for school he told me the news.
very calmly.
there were lots of towels on the floor.
that's what i remember seeing first.

i freaked out.
mostly when he told me it had leaked down into the ceiling of the basement.
brennan's room to be exact.
and then the more we investigated the more we realized it was more than just wiping up the floor we were going to be dealing with.
wet carpet out into the dining area.
bowed up laminate flooring from one end of the kitchen to the other.
and the brand new beadboarded island dave had done two days before had to be ripped out all the way around the bottom.
oh, and it wasn't just one night of flooding, it was at least three.
this is what we gathered from the discovery of the base around the island that sean then remembered he saw water marks on saturday night when he was vacuuming.
the carpet under the kitchen table:)
and then i remembered that i had found the dishwasher hadn't run fully through on friday,
and wasn't that weird at the time???
but now it was making all of this sense.
and everything was coming together like this giant puzzle of leaking water mess.
so we called our water dryer restoration guy.
and i called the rc willey people,
and the fans and dryers and dehumidifiers and appliance guy flooded {no pun intended} our home that monday and tuesday morning.

after 3 days of brennan's basement room being heated to 90*F and an appliance man who spent 2 hours watching our dishwasher NOT leak a single drop of water, and sean and i laying on the kitchen floor for 2 hours watching our dishwasher with flashlights underneath while it ran NOT leaking a
SINGLE
DROP
OF
WATER,
it was determined that new floors had to go in,
and we were just going to have to have the appliance man come back out.
{actually i laid there with him for half an hour which was about 30 min too long for my heavy with child self.}

welp,
the next morning the rc willey people called and said there was nothing they could do where they found nothing wrong,
and that's when my desperation really hit rock bottom.
it's possible i MAY have lost it a bit on the phone.
i wasn't mean,
i didn't swear,
i just explained to michelle quite desperately that i have an entire kitchen floor being replaced and a basement ceiling that has flooded in saying that there IS in fact something wrong with it,,
and if they aren't going to send someone back out to fix this then i needed to know where to start sending all of these flood bills to because i wasn't going to just sit here and let my house keep flooding from a dishwasher that CLEARLY has something wrong with it.
she put me on hold to ask for a supervisor,
and i stood there feeling very irrational and a little out of breath,
and then she came back on the line and caught me off guard when she said they had decided they would replace my old dishwasher with an upgraded new one,
and when would i like that installed?
i stumbled over my words for a minute,
told her i wasn't expecting that and thank you very much,
and felt a little embarrassed for getting so worked up,
then i scheduled a time for the new dishwasher to be installed,
and wondered if maybe they were the ones that got off ahead by just giving me a new dishwasher.
cause man they offered that up pretty fast.

{my mama's tied and true tested method for dishwashing without a dishwasher. soapy water all day folks. just keep adding them in. then rinse at the end of the day, and dry overnight. one week of that was plenty for me to want a sprinkler in a box back in my kitchen again.}