It started on Thursday night. Madeline went downstairs to pick out some games to take to school for their month end party. "Mom," she calls upstairs, "the floor is wet!" Either the sewer had backed up, or the basement was leaking, which it's never done before, but we have had some rain... Yes, it's the sewer. Then Sean gets home, and we move everything out of the corner and Sean calls Roto Rooter. He'll be over as soon as he's done his other overtime job. He does his thing and tells us that the cardboard tube covered in tar (seriously?) has collapsed on the bottom, so we'll need to have the line replaced. Oh, yeah - overtime is $175 an hour.
Sean vacuumed up the water in his shop vac and dumped it a bunch of times. Then the carpet got rolled back and we ripped up and threw out the underlay and the lino tiles over the concrete. There's a nice crack on our concrete floor.
Friday morning I rented a Rug doctor and steam cleaned the carpet, then did it again after work, along with the hall, stairs and porch; figured why not, since I paid to rent it anyway! Sean started making calls to get quotes from the people who come and fix things and leave a big 'grave' of a mess on your lawn. Then we went to the farm Friday night and Saturday and didn't worry about it.
Sunday I picked up some kitty litter which we sprinkled under the carpet and in the laundry / storage room which was a bit damp, too, and that did a good job of taking away the last of the damp and odor.
Monday and today Sean talked to people about prices and now we've got our week laid out. The tree cutting down guy is coming tomorrow, and the trenchers and fixers are coming Thursday or Friday. The line goes right under our big (hugely tall) evergreen, so it has to go. I'm sad, because it's a big beautiful tree, but at the same time, our house faces north and the tree blocks the biggest window. Our living room is slightly cave like. I'm hoping having the tree gone will improve that. And pine trees kill grass. We've been fighting to grow grass on that part of the lawn for a decade. Once the 'grave' is gone, there is hope for beautiful grass!
So, because tree cutter guy is coming tomorrow, tonight after supper we went out in the dark and got to work. Remember all that nice landscaping we did this summer? It all got undone. Sean took the steps off the deck, I moved all the bricks to a corner of the yard, and Madeline moved all the mulch to a safe place. And then, Sean pounded out all the slats of our fence and we threw pretty much the whole thing in the back of the truck. Now, we are planning to re do our fence anyway, and we had talked about just ripping out the front and not replacing it. We hadn't decided on when, but now it's half done. The truck was full or we'd have done it all. We'll have to get the other half done soon so it's doesn't look quite so awkward. Here's some shots from tonight; check back soon for more drastic changes to our home front!!
Before the destruction begins. (Fun big work lights!)
Sean with the steps off, adjusting under the deck; Madeline bagging the mulch from around the tree.
After: mulch raked over, bricks moved, steps off...
The fence, before.
1 comment:
Amazing what you can do when it HAS to be done right NOW! But too bad when it doesn't fit into other nicely laid plans. I guess that's life. Have a fun week - wish I could be there to help.
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