Less than a week after we got home from our wonderful southeast swing, a break in our pipes caused our sewer line to explode through the toilet in the main floor guest bathroom. I actually saw it happen (so glad we were home!) so yelled to Barney and Jason who were upstairs. And they came running.
Barney and Jason stopped the flow and got the wet-vac from the garage to start cleaning up the smelly mess. Luckily it didn’t get to the furniture or the area rug.
Their attempt to clean up the messy explosion.
The plumber came within 30 minutes to turn off the sewer, and the people came to start drying out the floors by the end of the day. Such a shock to have this happen. But this lemon actually turned into lemonade, but that story is at the end of this blog.
day 2 – plumber
The next day the plumbing guys came back to fix the leak in the pipe.
Good bye plants; the hole has to be dug.
A number of feet down they found where the pipe came into the house.
Here’s the pipe coming into the house that they had to fix.
While quite a bit of damage was done in the basement as the “liquid” went down the walls and through the floors, I’m not going to include the mess that Bob, the gentleman who lives with us downstairs, had to navigate. He did well with all that happened and the workers who spent time in his living area.
next couple of weeks
For about a week we had to live with these noisy blowers, upstairs and down. Sometimes when we were in the kitchen, we did turn them off for a little while.
Two weeks later, the estimator came from the company that would be restoring our home. Nick was wonderful and worked well with our insurance carrier, USAA.
Then the repair men started coming to tear up and cart away the destroyed wallboard and wood.
Such a sad-looking guest bathroom.
Floors, drywall, and carpet were cut out wherever necessary.
They got down to the bare plywood.
Do you know how hard it is to get rid of a working toilet that we replaced? Finally I put it on Facebook Marketplace for free, and a family who really needed it picked up it and another one we replaced.
Furniture from the office and hallways made it into the living room. We just had to ignore the confusion.
Meanwhile, life goes on. Barney and I decided we needed to get back into shape so signed up at Senergy Fitness, about a half mile from our house. We actually were involved in a CrossFit gym at this location for a couple of years until it closed down after their rent went up.
Really didn’t know what we were getting into but knew we needed to get stronger.
Brad’s been doing our personal training and is wonderful. Barney has “graduated” to the class portion of the offerings, but I’m not that strong yet.
During this time we also got to go to our granddaughter Mackenzie’s singing and piano recital. So proud of her!
1 month later – packout
New word for you? Me too. Because all of the hardwood floors had to be sanded and stained, everything on the first floor had to be packed up and moved out. The three of us packed up the china from my grandmother and other items we didn’t want anyone else to have to worry about packing.
Barney and Jason at work.
The dining room is so bare now.
Then the team came to pack-up everything on the first floor.
They dusted and then covered each chair leg.
a bird’s eye view of their work
Everything was so well wrapped up, and it was all done in a day! The crew was a delight to have around.
empty office
empty family room
empty eating area – oh my
living without furniture during Christmas
For breakfast, we kept our stools and sat at the center area.
We made our porch into our “home” for Christmas.
Stockings were hung on a bookcase in an upstairs reading room that we decorated.
Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners got to be with our Georgia family’s home.
Christmas evening Barney set up an outside firepit (propane gas) outside of our open garage–until it started to rain.
work on the floor
After Christmas, the floor guys started in on their part of the restoration process. They were such pros.
So many of the wood slats had to be replaced.
At the same time, the painters were working upstairs and down, even repairing some water damage from years ago.
When the sanding started, we had to move out. Our home for about a week was at a close by extended stay hotel. It was convenient, but it wasn’t home.
Family room and eating room floors all were sanded.
The kitchen was protected before the sanding started.
They gave us 5 options of stain. Having a piece of flooring from before helped.
Our first look at the floor was from the door to the garage. We couldn’t walk on it for 3 days.
During this time we celebrated Barney’s birthday with our Georgia family.
This was our next look at the floor came when we got to move back in. Since we didn’t have furniture, we opened up our sports chairs.
new floors, new paint job, and new carpet
Barney added a folding table and chairs, and I contributed the camping tablecloth. So much better to sit at the table for breakfast.
1 month later – furniture’s back
Almost a month later, the boxes and furniture came back.
See how well the chairs were wrapped?
Since we had to wait for about 3 weeks before we could put the area rugs back down, waiting this long for our furniture meant everything could be put where it belonged.
The furniture was unwrapped and put into place and the boxes were emptied all in one day. It took me another day to put decorative items where they belonged.
2 weeks later – wallpaper
A couple of weeks later the wallpaper guy came in and put new wallpaper on the bathroom walls. We actually saw this wallpaper on a new episode of NCIS Hawaii. Guess we chose a current wallpaper.
We did find out that most of the wallpapering jobs that are done these days are for TV shows and movies. Since the producers are always wanting to change the look of a room, this is the cheapest and fastest way to do it.
now for the lemonade
Through this interruption to our lives, we got our hardwood floors looking like new, most of the downstairs painted, and a fresh look to all of the rooms as I rearranged items and organized better. The last time we did this was in 2001 when we moved in. Here’s a look at our lemonade:
Here’s the family room with our large kudzu wreath (if we ever move, it stays here in its perfect place).
entryway to guest bathroom and living room
We love our new lemonade.
But—about a week ago, Barney saw water on the floor in the garage behind the refrigerator. Yes, a pin-hole leak in the plastic tubing caused water to flow. When Barney pulled out the refrigerator to turn off the water, a gush of standing water came out onto our beautiful new hardwood floors, and they started buckling right away. Downstairs we have a large stain in the ceiling. The restoration people will be coming back soon.
now the good news
During this time we joined a small group from church with other empty nesters. This is going to be a fun time!
To finish this blog on a happy note (for us), we’re starting to stage for our next 3-week get-away to south Florida to see our family there. Can’t wait to get warm.
