I think any parent can attest that having one child or more greatly affects one’s memory skills.  All of a sudden, your brain is filled with less useful information, like recalling every single scene in the 6 Star Wars movies because your children are too scared to watch Darth Vader on TV but are fine reading all about him and deeply concerned about the fate of the monster in the garbage compactor in the maintenance level.  Or recalling all of the funny combat stories you can from World War II because the boys loving hearing about Americans throwing potatoes at the enemy submarine….  Then distraction also enters into the picture.  You start a task, get interrupted, start the request, are interrupted again, begin the third request before finishing the first two and suddenly, the laundry room has flooded.  It really is the little things at that do you in.

Four days before Christmas, Joel and I had no intention of cleaning the den carpet or moping the laundry room floor but things happen.  We built our to do list that morning and were alternately playing with the boys and completing a task.  It was late afternoon, when I looked outside and noticed it was not raining and the temperature was moderate (in the low 40′s).  The trees had finally stopped dumping leaves all over our backyard and if we wanted to avoid major moss growth come spring, it was time for me to rake them all up.  So, I put on my cold weather gear and headed to the laundry room to get some gloves.  I opened the laundry room door and my feet were instantly soaked by a tidal wave of water.  I stepped into about an inch or two of water and yelled for Joel.  I’d been doing laundry all day so my first thought was that the hose had come out of the wall again.  Then I looked at the utility sink.  It was overflowing with cold water.  I turned it off, unplugged the drain, and I yelled again.  Joel appeared.  ”What do we do????!!!!!”  He had spilled medicine on the upstairs carpet earlier that day so the carpet cleaner was already set up outside.  ”Let’s use the carpet cleaner to vacuum up water” I suggested.  Then I noticed the one load of laundry that hadn’t been done yet – towels.   Those were immediately thrown on the floor.  The boys came running to see what all the commotion was about.  ”STAY BACK” we both yelled.  I slogged out to the garage to grab the carpet cleaner and Joel started sucking up the water.

It was about this time that Joel noticed that our house slopes toward the den – WHERE ALL THE ELECTRONIC DEVICES ARE KEPT.  He had also set charging on the floor, the battery for his new lawn mower.  Very quickly, we moved items up and out of the way.  Then began in earnest, the drying out of the den and laundry room.  In the end, Joel probably sucked up 8 gallons of water with the carpet cleaner, and God only knows how much the towels and carpets absorbed.  For the next 2 hours, the boys played very well in the living room while clean-up occurred.

It was quite an exciting time and good nature water jokes abound.  So, lesson learned, Joel is not to be trusted with helping me with the laundry.  That’s how the whole thing started.  He was soaking some pants of mine in water in order to try to get a stain out.  (small price to pay…  Now, what can I do to get out of dishes???)