We got a RIDICULOUS amount of rain today. It started this morning about 6:00 and by 3 in the afternoon, we had gotten 10.75 inches. Yep, you read that right... almost 11 inches in about 9 hours. We didn't realize that there was a possibility of flooding so after church we had a leisurely lunch and when we headed home and the closer we got, the more we were starting to think there might be a problem. Our house is on a low spot and when it rains, the garage always looks like it's going to flood, but we've never had a problem though. Well, when we got home, the yard looked like a lake and when we pulled up to the house and opened the garage door, stuff started floating out. We opened the door into the laundry room and stepped into about 4" of water (which is a step down from the rest of the house, meaning that the water was RIGHT at the top of the step but thankfully hadn't flowed into the kitchen yet. It was coming in the front door too. Brian got out on the skid steer and tore up the front yard to help the water drain. While he was doing that, I was keeping the drain in the laundry room floor clear which helped it finally drain out. Mike and Susan came over to help us (the boys just happened to be at my parents house). Brian's digging efforts thankfully made a huge difference and no new water came in. I could not care less about the front yard being torn up. :) At this point though lots had already come in, and we using shop vacs to suck it up. The living room carpet is soaked (like you step and water shoots out) and our bedroom carpet is soaked on the front wall edge. Good times.
As for the outside... when we went out to get these pictures, the water had already receded quite a bit. You can see how full the tank is...
You can see across the tank that the chairs that I sit on when the boys swim are more than halfway underwater. They are usually about 4 or 5 feet from the edge.
That little black flag (sticking up in the water) is to mark the edge of the tank when it's "full". I think we're there.
The water got REALLY close to the new house. It washed the materials (lumber, roofing stuff, etc.) from the front of the house over against our neighbors fence. Two things I'm thankful for - that it didn't make it into the house and that it wasn't sheetrocked yet!
The water flowed over the new driveway and washed out some of it. When Brian had come out there to get the skid steer, he said the water was almost up to his knees. But the good news is that seeing where everything flowed will help to know exactly where the culverts need to go. :)
Now we're sitting in the house with the fans on high hoping they'll dry out the carpet. It could have been so much worse, so I'm quite thankful. :)
