What Happened When We Came Home...and...What Happens Now

After a long afternoon of planes and airports we finally arrived at home last Friday night at midnight. When we walked in (carrying 2 sleeping kids) we heard the sound of splattering water. What awaited us was a kitchen and hallway full of standing water. Evidently the thin plastic hose on the back of our refrigerator cracked while we were gone, and water leaked out all over the kitchen. To make matters worse the water seaped through the floorboards and vents and down into the basement. That's where most of the water collected and pooled up. We had about an inch of water in some places. All the dry wall in the basement was destroyed, and all the ceilings. On both floors all the floors were ruined. In fact, water had been leaking for so long that it spread into the living room, dining room, and study.

So now we're in rebuilding mode. All weekend SERV-PRO has been clearing out our furniture, ripping up ruined hardwood floors, ripping out drywall, and drying out baseboards. Our basement and entire main floor of our house are basically unuseable. We're basically walking on baseboards and concrete. We're basically living upstairs only as we wait for our insurance company to get the rebuilding process started.

In the span of a few hours we went from the happiest place on Earth to a nightmare. Jenny and I have gone through a range of emotions in the past few days, going from shock, to despair, to anger. Now I think we're moving into the acceptance mode, but we don't need this right now as we get ready for our move. This is such a bad time for this to happen.


















So what happens now? Well...as of yesterday we're all "dried out." Serv-Pro and State Farm both came by this morning and we all did a "walk through" to assess all the damages and start the rebuilding process. I've elected to have Serv-Pro handle all the restoration (instead of trying to find a contractor on my own.) Throughout all this Serv-Pro has been great, so I'm not about to change course now. So anyway, everything that was damaged has been tossed out and gotten rid of, so Serv-Pro is going to begin installing new drywall tomorrow, so we're getting started right away. That's encouraging. Jenny and I need to go out this weekend and start looking for flooring, new cabinets, new countertops, etc.








We've been in this house for close to 6 years now, and a lot of the things we didn't like about our house we always kind of lived with. But now we have a clean slate on the basement and kitchen, and of course with all the floors, so we might make a few changes through all of this. Might as well. So if there is a silver lining to all of this it's that we get to customize the house more to our liking. Just trying to stay positive I guess.

Life At Random - Disney World Edition

Our Disney trip was a success. My parents had a very memorable 50th anniversary, as all week every employee in all the parks congratulated them (seeing their pins on their shirts.) Some highlights included a dinner at the "Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue," dinner at the "T-Rex restaurant," and a special anniversary dinner at the California Grill. But most of all we all enjoyed seeing Disney World lit up, and all decked out for Christmas. At times it was pretty stunning.