Audrey crawled into our bed at 3 am on Sunday morning and sweetly asks “Mommy, why is there water on the floor and on the carpet?”

 

I quickly got up and walked out of my bedroom and right into what seemed like a couple inches of water (Mike says it was only 3/4 " maybe 1").  EVERYWHERE! My whole kitchen was flooded. So was the living room and dining room. 

 

Audrey tells Daddy “It’s not much”

 

I slushed through the water to locate the leak and made my way to the utility room.  There it was.  Right as I left it.  Water running in the utility sink, kids toys bobbing on top.

 

I couldn’t believe my eyes! I couldn’t believe that I forgot!  I left the water running all night long!

 

Mike got out of bed and right away we started cleaning up.  Dumbfounded, I grabbed a mop (gee, it's only 3 in the morning).  Yeah, like that’s going to help. Mike chuckles. He goes into the garage and grabs the shopvac. Which didn’t work at all. So the only thing left was the Bisselle steam cleaner.  It worked but very tedious dumping the water basin out every 5 minutes.  Mike says we dumped about 85 - 100 gallons of water.

 

(Not fun. Oh yeah, I cried. A little. Don't think I didn't beat myself up about it. But you see, if I would've gotten up around 9 or 10pm and had that late night cigarette that I wanted, I would've found this before it got too bad. And it's not like I don't try to multi-task around the house being a working mom and all.  I'm only adding these statements out of spite because I wouldn't want some people to think that I'm naturally blond.  Of course, I shouldn't have to point out the fact that some doctors think  I have a condition which clearly affects my memory. Even though I don't want to believe that I have that "condition" anyway. )

 

We worked and worked our bones ‘til they cracked! Then we crashed on the bed for a couple hours. Cameron slept through all the noisy vacuuming. Audrey watched cartoons in our bedroom with the door shut and said “why do you guys keep coming in here? I can’t hear the tv.”

I praised Audrey for saving the day and she says "yeah, if it was longer and I opened my bedroom door then my bed would have floated away!"

I called the emergency 24 hour restoration people at 8am.  They came right away. Very nice people.

 

There goes our carpet.  Bye bye.

 

Twelve blowers later, kids and dog are at Grandma’s, Mike and I are trying to sleep in 100+ degrees (it overloaded our thermastate) and very loud noise.  I’m surprised I heard my alarm clock.  Three days of this.  Yippee!

 

Our whole house is turned upside down. I can’t imagine what people went through with real floods and hurricanes! We were lucky. We didn’t lose any furniture or valuables.

 

I looked at Mike and said “now’s the time to get that hardwood flooring we talked about for years”

 

It’s going to get messier before it gets better. We’ve got to rip up the tile in the kitchen. Probably move the island over to give us more space. Maybe swap places with the stove and sink and give ourselves a window where the microwave used to be.  Who knows maybe we’ll even move the whole pantry out some and give ourselves a hallway too.

 

It’s never a small feat for my man.

 

I take full responsibility for this but I gotta tell ya what led up to it. For days Cameron’s been backed up. The poor little buggar was so miserable. We tried Miralax.  We tried fruit. We tried refried beans.  He was not getting his poop out. Late Saturday night I give him and Audrey a nice warm bath. 

 

Remember Caddy Shack and the Baby Ruth? Audrey was so upset when she saw it in the tub. I was so happy. Cameron was the happiest.

 

With the kids and Dad finally put to bed and asleep, I cleaned up. I put the toys in the utility sink to sanitize with bleach water.   The rest is history.