No, this isn’t a running disaster. This is a real life problem.
In September 2013 (4 months ago!) we moved into an old, beautiful house. We weren’t originally sure if we liked it, but we grow to LOVE it more and more every day. I feel so fortunate to have found a perfect house in the perfect location for my family. And just as I was feeling like the luckiest person ever, a little disaster struck. A few days ago, an old boiler pipe decided it had enough, and split.
Above you see the piece of cast iron pipe that had enough. What started as a trickle of water down the walls, ended up pouring water through the light sockets, and finally gushing water that collapsed part of the ceiling in our music room and the largest room in our basement.
Jeff was flying back from California and thank goodness my mom was here. We saved my great grandmother’s sewing machine, our guitars and amps, and some of Currie’s instruments, but as we tried to move the piano, a piece of ceiling fell on my mom’s back (along with the light fixture) and we decided it was too dangerous to enter the rooms where water was flowing. The water company came to shut off the water, but didn’t arrive for 40 minutes from the time we called so you can imagine our mess.
Our finished basement still had boxes of photo albums and books (moving in, having a baby 2 weeks later, and having the holidays around the corner doesn’t make for a very productive few months of unpacking) so we quickly saved everything that had sentimental value and the rest was ruined…
You can see pieces of the ceiling that fell on the sectional sofa and the cooler I moved to catch the water (HA, that was pointless!).
So that’s what we’ve been dealing with this week! All the contractors who have come in have said something along the lines of “holy sh!t”. Yeah, we have a lot of damage…
But, my runs still happened. I didn’t end of taking any days off, but a few runs were shorter than I would have liked. I wanted to do some mile repeats but the bitter cold and snow (and stress from this mess) made me delay that workout. Instead, I’m going to race a 5 miler on Sunday. The race website describes the course as “challenging” with “FYI, a great uphill finish”. I’m really starting to love hills, so we will see what I think of this course.
And Wells is 15 weeks old (as of Friday)! (Currie will be 4 years old in less than a month now!)
Sibling love of the day.
And here are the 15 week postpartum pics! Not racing in these briefs/buns tomorrow. I’ll wait until it gets a little warmer!
15 weeks postpartum!
Question for you!
Any random house disasters to share?!
My bedroom at my parents house is in the basement and has a hot water heater in one of the closets. About a year ago it broke/burst/died and flooded my room. There wasn’t that much water but because I was at school the flood wasn’t noticed for a few days. Nothing compared to your disaster though. Hopefully there isn’t too much damage or nothing important got ruined
Oh man… that can be trouble when the flood isn’t noticed for awhile. I keep thinking what would have happened if we were out of town? Or even not in the house for a few hours? I can’t even imagine what would have happened…
Oh lord, that reminds me of last year in Oswego when my whole ceiling came down at that house…I am so thankful to forever be away from there. (My landlord wanted to fix it herself…).
Anyways glad everyone is safe. Which race are you doing?
Oh yes, I remember you talking about your crazy landlord!
I did a race called Frigid 5 miler. First race in Pittsburgh (area). It was crazy tough!
I’m so sorry!
Is your mom ok?
Good luck tomorrow
Xoxo
Hi Ruby! Thank you! Yes, my mom is getting better. She has a 6 inch long bruise going down her back.
She’s tough though so she will be fine!
Oh MY GOSH! What a mess. I can only imagine the headache, not to mention with having two little ones. I’m glad everyone is safe – best of luck getting it resolved. I hope your insurance can cover most! Have fun with the race this morning- demolish that uphill finish!!
Thanks Lindsey! Well, I didn’t demolish the uphill finish but I survived. That counts, right?!
Oh my gosh Jen that is awful. I am so sorry stuff got ruined! We had a pipe burst last week in the middle of the night but it was in our basement (the unfinished part) so only a few things were ruined and fortunately we were home and awake. Nothing compared to what you’re dealing with!!! I hope the race went well today!
Thanks Abbey! I’m glad you guys were up and not too much was ruined! This is a mess, but hopefully it will all be fixed in the next month… I doubt we will have everything replaced by then but we can at least go back to normal living!
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OMG! That’s looks worse than I imagined. Holy crap! I’m so sorry.
OMG Jen I can’t even imagine! I am glad first and foremost you are all alright! (I hope your mom’s back isn’t hurt!). We had some issues with the ceiling in our living room but nothing to that extent (or even close!). I hope you are able to get things fixed soon, and I am sorry for anything you lost- must be incredibly frustrating!
Thanks Laura! Yes, it’s frustrating and really time consuming, but hopefully will all be shiny and new within a month. Fingers crossed!!
So sorry to hear about your house damage! That’s awful. We just had a pipe burst in our rental property but fortunately the only damage seems to be the carpet and a small portion of drywall. The real pain has been dealing with the insurance company (meaning — dealing with a complete lack of communication from them!!!) — hope yours is better than ours!
Great job in the race, btw. What kind of sadist creates a course with a huge uphill finish?!
Same here on the insurance company, Paige! Taking a long time, no idea what’s going on often… Still don’t have original pipe fixed or boiler heat working! They say tomorrow and Friday they will get a few things done. We shall see!
Oh, that looks awful. Long time reader here, but this is my first time commenting. Do you remember that random earthquake on the east coast a couple of years ago? Well, my family and I had finished the first round of renovations on the old “fixer-upper” that we had just bought and all of our stuff was stored in the basement when we went out of town for the week. While we were gone, the earthquake knocked over a mirror that I had propped (precariously, it turns out) over the upstairs bathroom sink. On its way down, the mirror knocked the faucet and turned on the water over the very slow flowing drain. (Fixing this had been way down on our to do list. You know how it is with old houses!) The water ran for the whole week we were gone so that when we got back, we had to replace the floors on the second floor, the ceilings and floors on the first floor, and finally reseal the floors of the basement, where all the water ended up. We also had to throw out most of our stuff because it was swimming in water. We were in a hotel for 6 weeks with a new baby while the repairs were done. It was a nightmare- I absolutely feel for you and your family!
On another note, I’ve really enjoyed reading your blog since you had Wells. Well, it’s always been interesting but I’m in a similar, albeit not so fast, boat at you. I just had a daughter at the beginning of October and am getting back into running as well. You’re braver than I am for posting postpartum pictures though!
Wow, Robin! Those house troubles sound a lot worse than mine! Sorry you had to deal with that! I will never forget what a hassle this whole situation has been and I’m sure the same is true for you! Thank you for sharing! I love old houses, but they really can cause some big problems…
I’m sure your postpartum pics would be great!
It has been a lot more fun than I expected documenting each week. Just looking in a mirror, I feel like I look the same, but I can see little differences in the pictures each week and it’s kind of cool!