A Small Water Problem

Almost a month ago we had a small water problem at our house. Water in our home is a very nice thing, as long as it stays where it is supposed to. We had some that didn’t. So we had three rooms upstairs and every room downstairs that got wet. Two bedrooms and the laundry room were unaffected. That was enough that we’ve made an insurance claim for it. So first, the day it happened, we cleaned up all the water (and it was a lot) and hauled out tons of wet stuff, out to the garage to dry out. Then the insurance had an outfit that came and dried the walls and floors out. We had eight or nine industrial fans and two great big dehumidifiers going for about a week. Talk about noise. You practically had to yell or be standing next to the person you were talking to if you wanted to be heard. These blowers chain together (i.e., you can plug one into another so they put some of them together on each other) and then just plugged them in to the closest outlet. Well, of course that would trip circuits so the first day or so we had to rearrange how they had them plugged in so we didn’t keep tripping circuits. That was an interesting experience. At one point our freezer downstairs went all night without running. Fortunately it never got opened during that time and everything in it was fine.

As things were drying out the service also began tearing out stuff that was damaged and ruined by the water. We did some of that, too. One nice thing about all this is that the insurance let us do some of the work and considered it compensable so we were able to take care of our deductible that way. Anyway, carpet, paneling and ceiling tiles went out. It was like moving again to pack up all the stuff so we could move furniture and stuff out of the way to be able to get all the wet stuff out. Because the dining room got wet flooring had to come out. That meant our kitchen table went out to the garage. So we’ve been without a kitchen table for almost a month now. I had never realized how central a kitchen table is to so much of what goes on in a home. We haven’t been able to have a comfortable sit-down meal at home for almost a month now. Or think of all the other stuff that gets done at the kitchen table; homework, other study, family games. All kinds of stuff. Downstairs everything got ripped out pretty much clear to the studs. So you could stand over by the fireplace and see clear into the back corner of the back bedroom. Nice wide open feeling.

I really haven’t been taking pictures at the various stages of all this uproar. I have had no desire to do that. This week they began the reconstruction. The first thing that happened was our stair well got patched and painted. Right at the foot of the stairs a little bit of drywall went clear to the floor and so it got wet. A chunk not quite a square foot had to be taken out and patched. And to have it all match the entire stair well had to be painted. That matching principle is working to our favor in all this. Now they have started putting up paneling in the family room. We got to pick the paneling, ceiling tile, laminate flooring and carpet. That was nice. They did some analysis on the stuff that had been taken out and gave us the price range, based on the quality of materials that was damaged. So we got to pick the new stuff. We went with lighter paneling in the family room. The stuff that was in there before was pretty dark so this new stuff will lighten up the room quite a bit. The new carpet down there will be a little darker, too. I think the ceiling tiles will be next and then probably the carpet installation.

At one point I had hoped they would do the dining room first so we could get our kitchen table back but if the downstairs gets done first that’s okay, too. That room has been the most work because it’s so big and has the most stuff in it. Once they finish that room and we can put everything back it will really reduce the chaos in this house. The kids whose room is down there have basically been living out of suitcases all this time. It will be nice for them to be able to get back to some sort of normalcy again. And while the carpet has been out some ladies from church offered to come help paint our bedroom since we’ve never been really happy with the green walls in there. So that got finished yesterday and it looks so much nicer in there. We’ve been very blessed by several of the people at church who have been willing to come on short notice and help us at various stages of this mess. It’s been amazing. It’s really true what they say, “Many hands make light work.”

It’s so nice to see the reconstruction finally getting started. They are not moving at a real fast pace but every day they do work things get looking better and it just cheers the soul to see the house getting put back together. In some ways this actually has been worse than moving, if you can believe that. But this has been another example of the Lord helping us thru the adversity. It’s unrealistic to expect the Lord to spare us from all adversity but time and time again He shows his mercy by giving help to get through the adversity. It’s a marvelous principle once you begin to see and understand it.