Flood cleanup, Christmas, and a surgery

 How was your last month and a half?   Mine?? It was a piece of cake! 🙄  Soooooo much has gone on in the last month and a half, it feels like it should be 2027 already.

I will start with the flood since that's where I left off.  We were able to get back in our house on Saturday (flood happened Friday morning).  We spent that weekend cleaning out Damian's living area.  Chris has a cousin whose wife works for a restoration company that specializes in water damage.  They were on top of it, the wife called the owners (apparently she's friends with them) and the company called me almost immediately.  I was not prepared for it, we were still at my sister's house, my house was still flooded, I had no idea what kind of damage was still being done inside, it just felt rushed.  They were very nice, I was rather grumpy.  Chris actually was on top of calling the insurance company, so that was done quickly.  We still had water in our house.

After a couple weeks, the delay was mine not theirs, they came by and started removing drywall, insulation, and the flooring.  The water had gotten up to a foot inside (I REALLY wish I had pictures of it) and they said they will remove 2 feet because of seepage.  They said they would spray the studs with something that would kill and prevent the mold spores from spreading. Then they put big "fans" and a couple of giant dehumidifiers and it sat for a long time.  They have finally removed all their stuff and are now fighting with our insurance for payment.  They also partner with a company that does the repairs, so that company contacted me and came out and looked at what needed to be done.  We are waiting on an estimate for that, and I'm sure that company will have to fight our insurance as well, but because we are no longer in "emergency" state, they won't start work until estimates have been given and accepted.

We moved Damian's mattress upstairs where our Christmas tree was, and he is sleeping on that.  Asher is sleeping on the couch, and it just makes everything much smaller.  We have no idea when the work will start, much less when it will be done.

The county we live in offered free dump runs to anyone affected by the flood, so my sister came up 3 weekends (not in a row) with her husband's truck and helped us load stuff up and take it to the dump. 

I forgot to mention. . . after we were woken up in the night to the water coming in, Damian was getting stuff to take upstairs and slipped on the stairs (wet feet) and fell pretty hard, hurting his back.  Then when we got back on Saturday, he was again going up the stairs and slipped again and hurt his back even more.  That meant that he was not super helpful with moving stuff from the garage.  Plus, Chris's hip replacement surgery was scheduled for Jan. 6th, and he was very gimpy because his hip was bad, so he was no help at all.  Pretty much that left all the heavy lifting (literally and figuratively) to me and my sister.  I am soooooo thankful for her.

I am not sure how many dumps runs we did.  At least 2 every day she was here, but I think there were 3 or 4 runs the first day, I don't remember.  

We had my Dad's old truck in our garage and the guy who owns it now was very nice and came and took it the weekend after the flood so we'd have more space in the garage.  I am very thankful for that as well.  We were told to take pictures of everything, so I have soooo many pictures, but not one that encompasses the giant mess of the garage.  

Maddox was done!

I was not good at taking pictures of the stuff inside Damian's area.  I didn't realize they wanted the stuff, not the walls and floor.  I did take a video, which is not good quality, but it's all I have.  And thankfully I have it because I had to pull screenshots off it to show the insurance adjuster stuff we want replaced, still terrible quality, but it's something. 

Damian's back?  Oh, yeah, he was going down the outside stairs a couple weeks later and slipped again.  He caught himself weirdly on the railing, but it tweaked his back again.

While this was happening, we still had to do Christmas.  The flood happened on Dec. 12.  I think we got the last of the stuff out on Jan 10, that was mostly just appliances.  We had to get rid of our refrigerator and freezer that were in the garage, and I had a washing machine that was brand new 10 years ago, and only used for less than 6 months.  I was not in the Christmas mood at all this year.  It's good I decorated before the flood, because there's no way I would have done it after.  I still have all the decorations up because I don't want to deal with it.  I would pay someone at this point to undecorate my house.

Plus, Chris had hip replacement surgery on January 6th, and was not allowed to do much for 2 weeks.  I took 3 weeks off to help him, this was my first week back.  He's doing okay now, walking without a cane, and says he's feeling okay.  He still has days where he's more sore than he'd like to be, but I am happy it's done and we see the light at the end of that tunnel. 

Honestly, I thought this post would be longer. I was thinking I'd end up doing another one for Christmas and a third one for Chris's surgery, but I don't think I need to.  For me, this year, Christmas sucked.  I was stressed the entire time, and had very little help.  Actually I may come back and do one on Chris's surgery, that has a story, but he's okay.

So I guess now we wait.  Wait to see what happens next and when I can get people out of my living space.  😆