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For, lo, the snowfall is past, the wind has come and gone; the shovels appear on the earth; the time of the freezing of water pipes is come, and the voice of the snowplow is heard in our land!
Speaking of which…
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And while we’re on the topic…do you remember this?
- Our fireplace
Yesterday morning, having decided to go back to sleep after taking my temperature, I was rudely (re)awakened at 6:10a.m. by my husband’s “urgent” voice: “OH NO! WE HAVE NO WATER!”
Three hours later, the plumbers arrived and diagnosed us with a serious case of the frozen pipes. (Editorial aside: in the 40-YEAR OLD HOUSE, the one with the old roof and the inefficient windows, we NEVER had a problem with frozen pipes.) Upon cutting drywall in our basement and laying the pipe open to the air, we discovered several things:
1. our water main comes into the house directly below the fireplace that’s had to be stopped up to stop the wind coming in
2. our unusually thick outer walls (2×6 instead of 2×4) have NO INSULATION IN THEM other than a house wrap.
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It’s a universal truth: in crisis times, it’s easier to find things to be thankful for. Like, for instance, running water. Our next door neighbor brought us four gallons of water; the neighbor two doors over from him saw the plumbing truck and offered us the use of his showers; the neighbor four doors down the other direction also offered us whatever we needed. We have great neighbors.
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And then my uncle and aunt came over to help us start the wall repair process–which involves a lot of insulation stuffed into the wall around the water main. We had dinner, including homemade pretzels–which I made because my editor at Liguori wants me to include a recipe in my family activity book for Lent, which will be out NEXT year.
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Has anybody read this book, Preschool to the Rescue? It’s the story of a sleepy, creepy, deeper than you’d think mud puddle. Well, in front of our house we have a sleepy, creepy, deeper-than-you’d-think snow puddle. It’s just loose snow, they think, and then SLURP! It gobbles them up. Twice yesterday Christian and I went outside to push people out of it. It felt good to help somebody else–not to mention get out of the house– following our morning’s drama.
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Well, enough about snow. After all, this Wednesday was Julianna’s 4th birthday, and we celebrated the week by putting her in underwear. So far we’re averaging 2 1/2 pairs a day. Not a great start, but her school suggested that self-care would be easier if she didn’t have to pull pants up and down over her cloth diapers.
Speaking of school, regular readers will know that every so often I obsess about Julianna’s future–long-term or short-term. Now that she’s 4 years old, it’s really pushing time to figure out what we’re going to do about kindergarten. We want to put her in Catholic school with her big brother but we aren’t sure it’s possible. My sister, hwoever, came up with a great idea last week. She suggested letting her do a year of Kindergarten in the public schools and then repeating it in the Catholic school. The more I think about it, the more I like this plan. It gives us an extra year to get her talking (since she’s still quite a ways off); it gives us a year to see if she’s capable of being in a classroom without a para, which is key to her being able to attend private school. So yay Andrea! You rock my world!
Kathleen M. Basi 
Sorry about your pipe problems, but glad you were well supported by family and neighbors.
Happy Birthday Julianna! Sounds like a great approach to kindergarden.
We have a similar problem with our fireplace and someone recommended that we make a cover for it out of the attic fan covers they sell at home improvement stores. Basically it’s a sheet of flexible stuff that you can velcro onto the fireplace to keep the draft out. It’s helped us immensely! Here’s what they look like.
Thanks, Niki. I’ll have Christian look at it. We’re going to have to address the greater problem of the draft inside the walls, I think, but this could be a good short-term solution! (For those who don’t know, which is just about everyone, Niki and I live in the same neighborhood and so we have similar ahem, construction issues!)
I’m sorry about your week with the bad pipes! Happy birthday to Julianna! I think that’s a FABULOUS idea! I wish maybe someone might have suggested that for my niece with autism…I STILL think she’d benefit BIG-TIME from simply repeating a grade…but, my sister won’t hear of it.
Being a classic overachiever, in another lifetime I wouldn’t have even considered this; it would have felt like a failure to repeat a grade. But now, especially up front, I’m rubbing my hands together with glee at the idea.
Are you kidding? Here in the land of overachievers it is en vogue to have your child repeat K, particularly if said child is male, for everything from “immaturity” to being “too short.” It’s getting ridiculous (I blame “Outliers.”) You have a valid reason to consider it– if it works for your daughter and expands your options that’s great!! Must bring you piece of mind to have a plan.
I agree – I keep hearing that lots of parents are starting to have their children repeat kindergarten, or start a year later. And, supposedly, it’s often because they want their sons to be better at sports (esp. football) in high school.
Omigosh, I’m going to have to roll my eyes!
Glad you all are okay. Happy birthday to Julianna! And I think the double kindergarten idea is a really good one.
Re #2–That looks an awful lot like MY deck, except the white caps were on garbage cans instead of chairs, and I think they were even thicker.
My son has shoveled most of it off now. We needed the garbage cans more than you need the chairs at present!
(I don’t know where you are, but I’m in Nova Scotia. That was a BIG storm.)
Oh, no. So sorry about your frozen pipes. Thank God for helpful neighbors!
Oh no! I’m so sorry to hear about your pipe mess. ACK!
Happy Birthday to Julianna and a big thumbs up for God’s provisions. I hope next week is less stressful!