One Thing Leads to Another

I'm glad I got out on this pre-blizzard day to snap a few photos.  I think it was one of the loveliest/non-life threateningly cold days of winter.  It's funny how things can go from beautiful to ugly, from serene to chaotic in such a short space of time.  

The snow has finally melted and temperatures are on the rise, so much so that we were outside all day working in short sleeves yesterday and the day before.  We had to be out working because the spigot for our garden hose broke and was spewing water.  No problem, with such low temps, we'd been expecting this and had a replacement spigot all ready to go.  Super easy, right?  Wrong.

We went to the water main to shut off the water so we could replace the spigot.  Got the spigot replaced and turned the water back on.  But the water main was so old that it snapped.  Now we had to go out and buy the replacement part for the water main.  An hour and a half later, we replaced the pipe to the water main and now we just had to wait two hours and fifteen minutes for the sealant to cure so we could turn the water back on.   

We picked up the kids from school, got dinner ready, ate, and then went out to turn the water back on and pray that the seal held and we weren't going to be up to our elbows in freezing water in the dark.  It worked!  Water flowed back to the house, no leaks.  Super easy, right?  Wrong.

 

Now it was dark and we were dirty and tired and wanted showers and to wash up the dishes, but there was no hot water.  We thought maybe it just needed time to reheat in the water tank, so we went about other evening chores for another couple of hours.  Still no hot water.  We boiled some water to wash the dishes and decided to forego the showers hoping that first thing in the morning the hot water would return.  Sounds simple, right?  You could not be wronger.

Next morning, still no hot water.  I boiled more water for everyone to have a quick bath and then we rushed the kids to school, picked up our grocery order and then came back to deal with the hot water situation.  Turns out while the water was shut off the heating element had "dry-fired" and burned itself out.  Fortunately, the former home owner left a brand new heating element next to the tank in case of such an event.  Sounds simple, right?  Do you see where I'm going with this?

We spent all day trying to drain the tank and in the process the valve to the tank broke spewing water everywhere.  Did I mention the hot water tank is in the wall behind my closet?  Guess whose shoes got an unexpected bath.  The tank was set in the floor so low, we couldn't get a bucket or pan under it to catch the water, so we just had to use towels to soak up the gush and eventually had to drill holes in the floor to drain it.  But wait, there's more.

Now, we needed to pull out the pipe attached to the valve to replaced the broken seal.  The pipe wouldn't budge and we briefly wondered if we were going to have to buy and new water heater all because of one small pipe.  Another trip into town led us to a replacement pipe with a removable valve, and it was on clearance!

We bought the pipe, picked up the kids from school, came home, replaced the valve and the heating element, threw the towels into the washing machine, turned the water back on, and waited.  It worked!  We decided to leave.  It would be at least two hours until we could shower, so we went out for dinner and discussed the possibility of moving to a country without indoor plumbing just to avoid having to do anymore plumbing repairs.

Not to mention that I spent these two days still hobbling around on my broken toe, and wondering how things went so wrong so quickly.  As with all things in life, it's just one thing leading to another.  But, we're a little wiser after this experience and we've definitely learned a thing or two, mainly that if this ever happens again, we'll just call a plumber.

Dress from Collectiflondon.com, Chicwish Cape, Bettie Page Heels, Gloves from Unique Vintage