The Rains Came Down, and the Floods Came Up...

What a fun week it's been...okay maybe not so much fun. I thought some of you might be interested in seeing some pictures from our craziness.

Sunday night it started raining. It rains a lot here, so we didn't think too much of it. As the night progressed, the tornado sirens kept going off. I was asleep and only partially hearing them. Kurtis could sleep through an actual tornado :) When the siren went off the 3rd time, I was awake enough to realize what was going on. I woke Kurtis up and went to check the National Weather Service for tornado warnings. We looked outside our living room windows and saw quite the sight. Our house was basically an island in a lake. I've seen the water get half way up the driveway from the street, but this was the worst. The water was halfway up the tires of my car, and all in our porch. Panic set in. The water was up to the doorstep of the backdoor. It was up to the step that goes down into the garage, and our entire garage was filled with 10.5 inches of water. We had about 3 inches of water in our main bathroom. What were we going to do with the baby? And the rain wasn't stopping. We were surrounded by water. Kurtis and I could swim, and fend for ourselves, but we have a sweet little helpless baby. That was the worst feeling in the world. I looked down towards the end of the street and could see that the rain was only partially up the tires of an SUV, and thought that if perhaps we could get to the end of the street, someone could come get us. So we had to make the choice, should we stay in the house, or try to get out while their was hope. We had to leave. We quickly packed some bags and as we ran around the house, water started squishing up from the crawl space into the carpet. One of my friends set out in her car to come get us, but had to turn around when her car started floating as she drove. She tried again in her neighbors Surburban...they couldn't leave the neighborhood. I next called (and woke up) the Cranes. Their street was ok. Peter agreed to come rescue us. He had to weave his way through flooded neighborhood streets, but he made it to the end of our street. So around 4 a.m. we put water shoes on, strapped the baby to Kurtis in her carrier, and each had backpacks of a few things. We walked out of our house into the water...it was very cold. We stayed close to the houses where most shallow...knee deep. We made our way to Peter's van. As we looked back down the street, this is what you could see.

The little license plate reflection on the end of the street on the right-hand side is Kurtis' car...this is how much water we had.

When you have to leave your house in the middle of the night, and wade through cold water with your baby strapped to you, it really makes you realize what is most important in this life. Material possessions don't mean a thing. We walked away with all we needed...each other.




The waters did recede. We packed up our house yesterday and left the house. The carpet is all wet and the musty smell is unbearable. We couldn't stay there with the baby, so we're staying at a few friend's houses until things get sorted out. Our landlord's flood insurance won't cover anything...apparently this wasn't a flood. Lots of water in houses...hmmm...not a flood. That's insurance for you. We really were "lucky" to not have as much damage as others, but it's still a mess. The flood was the result of too much rain too quick (2.5 inches in 2 hours), snow that hadn't melted, frozen ground, debris filled sewer drains, and the creek behind our house.

We weren't concerned with taking pictures at the time, so here's some pics of what we've been cleaning up.

The mess in the street.

Our new pond in the back...water that needed to soak back up into the ground...

View of the back of our house. This is normally is all grass. The water was up to the sliding glass door step.

The water was at least four bricks high in the front (see the pine needles)

This styrofoam covers the vents to the crawl space. The whole crawl space must have been filled with water.

Step to the sliding door... you can see the debris 4 bricks up...that's how deep it was in the back. Any higher and we really would have been filled up with water.

The inside of Kurtis' car. You can see the dirt marks on the shift, and standing muddy water in the coin tray. That's how deep his car filled up. It won't start and when we checked the oil it came back "mud." He's too funny.




And just to end on a happy note...our beautiful baby...5 months old :)