I’m about a week late in telling this story, but since it is some what on going I guess it’s ok.

A couple Saturdays ago, while working at our house, I got a call from Ma informing me that the toilet in the upstairs bathroom (between my Brothers room and my room) had cracked and flooded a portion of their house. While her and Nonna had cleaned up most of the mess, some of our boxes in the basement had gotten wet and we needed to come home to sort through them.

Her and my Dad were working in the garage for about 45 minutes when she entered the basement and found a lake of water at the bottom of the stairs. She ran up to the main floor to find another lake. She ran up to the 3rd floor to find yet another lake and a toilet spewing water. Not good. The broken toilet flooded the 3rd floor foyer, dripped down to the main floor foyer and living room, and then down into the basement, hallway, and cantina.

Insurance and Restoration companies were called right away and fans and things were set up. The most concerning part was the wood floors on the 3rd floor, given the fact that they had sat in a lake for 45 minutes. Lucky these ‘water sucking’ machines were put in place right away to try to dry the wood out. How the water did not flow into any of the bedrooms is totally beyond me.

In total we had about 8 or 9 fans spread out over 3 floors, plus 3 dehumidifiers that ran 24/7. The noise from these machines were unbearable. Try sleeping next to a jet engine and see how refreshed you feel in the morning. After 3 days everyone in the house wanted to kill everyone else.

A few days later the guys from the restoration company came in to see how things were progressing. Everything was drying up nicely, but we still needed to keep the fans to make sure everything would dry out 100%. Thankfully they said we could shut them off at night so at least we could sleep.

This Friday the machines were taken out and pieces of drywall were removed to make sure everything behind them was dry and no mold was growing. Despite the initial disaster that the flood created and the annoyance of everything that came from it, it seems as though everything is going to be OK. The carpet in the living room and basement will be cleaned, and the walls will be patched up and painted.

Thought it could have been a lot worse, the past week as been a pain in the butt with all the noise and all the dealings with insurance companies and such. There is nothing fun and exciting about flood damage, even if you get to have the inside of your house repainted by professionals. Now my Moms biggest problem is what colours to paint everything.

I guess everyone is renovating this Summer!