We had more rain than ice where we are, and no power outages. I suspect that Nicole may still be without power, or only just had the power restored this morning. Her area, which is farther north, got hit particularly hard. I keep waiting to see her post so we know she's okay!
However, early Friday morning, around 6 am, while we were sleeping, one of our sump pumps died. We're not sure if it was simply overwhelmed with too much water at once, or what. Anyway, we ended up with a flood in the basement (discovered at 8 AM) - including the finished part which the builder promised would never flood (verbally, of course!!).
So we've spent the last 48 hours dragging out wet rugs, mopping up water, running industrial fans, doing endless loads of laundry (kids had lots of clothes strewn on the floor, and seasonal clothing stuck in bags under the bed), tossing out wet school papers, and decluttering/reorganizing so that nothing that can't get wet is touching the floors. And visiting YLF frequently whenever the need for a break hit me.
On the plus side, we took the opportunity to go through all the kids' clothes and cull out things they've outgrown. Laundered and put into bags and ready to be donated to some teens who may be happy to receive them this winter. I hope my kids are all done growing now!
Luckily, the sump pump was easily fixed and the finished part of the basement is designed in just such a way to anticipate potential flooding. We need to keep a close eye on the walls, and one floor may need to be replaced, but a friend of mine who's an expert on these sort of things said that the replacement is merely cosmetic and not to worry about it too much; focus on getting the walls and baseboards bone dry, keeping the dehumidifer and fans running, and keep sniffing around for musty odors. DH will also probably focus on installing yet another sump pump as a back-up measure.
We live on the bottom of a hill. We suspect that part of the issue is that they paved the road at the top of the hill about a month ago. So water that used to seep into potholes, is now rushing like a river down the hill towards the houses on our street. Because our neighbors all got flooded too.
It ticks me off that the city apparently didn't install any 100-year drains on the road when they repaved it. We once looked into extending the driveway on our property, but decided against it because the city required us to fork over $ for a 100-year drain, which was too costly. And yet, those regulations don't apply to the city when it repaves a street? Makes no sense to me!
Anyway, today's agenda is to unpack from the trip, do my laundry, and clean the rest of the house, which hasn't been cleaned in weeks because of work demands and all the traveling. I am gearing up to get the energy to get offline and start cracking on that. Plus we still need to get groceries into the house - the flood deterred us from that mission. And, I was planning to set up the tree tonight, but it may have to wait afterall.
