Friday, November 18, 2016

Flood Refugees... Again

Many of you will remember the flood of 2013. Our condo building suffered severe flooding, and Tom and I had to move out for about six weeks while the cleaning and remediation took place. It wasn't a great experience, but it was character buidling!

This past week, Tom and I became flood refugees again!

On Tuesday night, Tom and I were getting ready to make dinner, when I heard the sound of water falling. It sounded like the shower was dripping, except neither of us were anywhere near the shower! When I went to the washroom to check, water started pouring in through the ceiling vent. Tom rushed into the laundry room to grab a bucket, only to realize there was water coming in through the laundry room wall!

I grabbed our laptop and put it on the kitchen counter so we could look up the emergency contact number for the condo manager. No one answered when I called, so I grabbed Lacey (to keep her out of the water), and headed upstairs to knock on our neighbours door. When I got upstairs to the second floor, there were already several neighbours in the hall, and a lake pooling in the hallway.

The people in the unit above us turned on their washing machine, and then took their dog for a walk. The washing machine malfunctioned, and it filled with water until it overflowed. Water was flowing freely into our unit, and into the parkade below us. After the neighbours turned the water off, I headed back downstairs, only to find that there was water pouring into the kitchen, and leaking into our master bathroom. The kitchen leak started after I'd left, and unfortunately it occurred directly over the laptop-- where I had left it on the counter after looking up our emergency contact number. Tom tried to clear everything out of the way, but it still got wet.

After about a half hour after the water was turned off, the water slowed from a trickle to a drip, and finally stopped.

All in all, it was a pretty crappy night.

The next day I talked to an insurance adjuster, and he got a contractor over at our place within an hour. The contractors set up fans and dehumidifier units. Because our laundry room, master bathroom, kitchen and second bathroom were affected, there was equipment in each room, and it sounded like an airplane hangar. So we found ourselves being flood refugees once again. We've been staying with my in-laws for the last few days. We're hoping to head back home on Sunday.

Lacey is loving staying with grandpa and grandma! She has a whole new set of toys to play with, and one-on-one attention her hearts content!

We should be able to go on Sunday. The condo should be dried out, and then we'll need to wait to hear from insurance to find out when things will be repaired.

Monday, November 14, 2016

We Bought a HOUSE!

When Tom and I bought our condo 8.5 years ago, we only intended to stay there for five years. But the time kept creeping by, and suddenly, nearly 10 years had passed!

Our family of two grew to a family of three, and we managed not too badly in the condo. It has two bedrooms and two bathrooms, and with a thorough purging of stuff we made room for the baby.

But now Lacey is mobile and she's all over the place, into everything. She's a noisy little girl, and we can hear each other from every room in the condo. She needs space to roam, and we need more space!

We take possession on December 16, and we are both SO looking forward to moving in before Christmas. So now we're working on selling the condo, and keeping things clean for showings.

32 days to possession!