Grand Rapids Flooding

If it seems I have been neglecting the blog lately, I have. Not intentionally by any means of course. Trust me I would rather be writing a new post like I am right now. Writing to me is a stress reliever. I love getting lost in words turning into a sentence and either sharing them or hiding them. It's very lovely therapy!

But Wednesday Grand Rapids, Michigan had a lot of average storms with not so average amounts of rain fall. It continued through Thursday as well. We have a major river known as the Grand River along with many small rivers and streams. With the very unusual amount of rain fall (were talking inches here) rivers, neighborhoods along with roads started to flood. Thankfully we do not live really close to any of the major rivers. Although our home is at a ground water level? Bare with me if I don't explain this well! That's where a sump pump comes in. Once again I am not a handy woman or plumber, just your average home owner, but a sump pump is suppose to keep water from coming into your basement.

Thursday after dropping off our oldest at school, I got ready to go downstairs to start some laundry. Viv runs ahead of me and all a sudden I hear a splash. She runs back up the stairs in utter fear with an inch or so of water on the bottom of her pants. As I looked at her and comforted her, I knew this was not good. Our sump pump had broke and our basement was flooded. When I mean flooded, I mean everything in its path was soaked on the ground. Our daughters toy room carpet is completely wet along with toys. You know the squish squish sound of water? Yeah I am not a fan. 

After my handy husband fixed our sump pump because buying a new one at this time was not an option unfortunately. They were sold out everywhere around grand rapids. We were not the only ones with flooded basements by now. At least we were not alone in this case. Once the pump was keeping water out, somewhere we would keep getting water in( we still are as I'm writing this). Not sure why exactly. We think we know why. Either water coming up from the small cracks in the cement floor because the ground is holding too much water or the soaking wet stuff draining. 

Either way last night my husband and I finally had a control on the water, yay! We were finally making progress after vacuuming and dumping gallons upon gallons of water outside. Bye this time it was getting close to 1:30 AM and we were exhausted and stressed. Time to take a break and can to do dirty clean up tomorrow. Of course that would involve tossing and cleaning out the basement, not my idea of fun. As my husband went down to shut things off, of course our sump pump broke down again! Within seconds water filled up and we were left back at square one. 

The basement defeated us. I broke down into tears as I could no longer take the stress it was causing. Watching the water go under the water heater and sneaking its way to the furnace, we had to shut off all power to the basement and pray the house hold temp doesn't fall to much. We bundled the girls up extra in their beds and went to bed. There was nothing we could possibly do at this point but wait till a store opens at 6:00 AM. Not knowing how much more water would come in out basement let alone ruin more than what already is down there. Walls and such are already getting ruined out of our control.

We now have a new sump pump working, and cleaning out water, and have helping come later today. I know we could have it much worse like many others in our area who have been evacuated or rescued by boats. I will deal with this. I know God is testing us and we will show him we will get through this.  

To end this post I want to ask for prayers and send our prayers for everyone who is effected. And my prayers for Boston.