When I woke up Sunday morning everything was fine. I finished putting dirty dishes in the dishwasher from the night before, started it, fixed bacon for BLT's, and then went about cleaning the rest of the house. I also watered my plants, filled up the coffee pot, and fed and gave water to the chickens. After all that I saw our household lights blink a couple of times. I went and told my sleeping husband about it and he said hmm. He got up and fixed his coffee and we discussed what would cause the lights blinking. Maybe the tree service down the street hit a line or something.
Then the grandboy got up to take a shower and there was no water. Well, now we know. Husband cleaned the well points...I don't know what that means but it didn't work. Then he figured out the pump wasn't working.
Where did we get our water?
I grabbed the two gallon jugs full of water I keep in the kitchen floor in case I need them to fill up the chicken water when the outside faucet is frozen, and washed the dishes (warming up the water on the stove). Our go to well man wasn't opened till 10 so before he took our boy home he went to the garage and pulled out two big 5 gallon water jugs, one was empty and the other was frozen solid . The grandboy took the frozen one inside to thaw and they took the other one to my daughter's to fill up. She had two more so she filled up those for him too. She was a blessing for sure!
So four big five gallon jugs and two gallons of water...how did we use them? I washed dishes twice (once after breakfast and dinner), we flushed the toilet a couple of times, and of course we washed out hands. It goes fast.
What was amazing to me was the amout of water it takes to flush a toilet...2 1/2 gallons!
Hints for the toilet: Filling up the tank with water instead of the bowl seems to work the best. If you have hard water like us fill it up to the rust line you see in the tank. It will not flush without enough water. I wasted a lot of the water figuring this out while he was gone.
It was fixed by Monday afternoon, for $1300 and $20 for our family of 3 with coupons for Arby's Roast Beef (ha ha). We are so proud to have water again!
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8 comments:
One of those things we just take for grated. Amazing how lost we are without it! Glad it is fixed.
Oh I'm so glad you have water again!! Ouch on the bill though.
We have a well too, so when the power goes out, so does the water. I can do without electricity easier than water. After the derecho in 2012, we were without power and water for 11 days. Hope we don't have to go without water that long again. I keep some water in cat litter containers for potty flushing water now, just in case.
I laughed at the rust line in the tank! We have them, too. I recently read that citric acid would clean up the rust stains and I am happy to report that I have white toilets now!
Cheryl, I have candles, flashlights, radios everything but water that is most important of all!
Kathy they are building a new house on our street and they are trying to save to drill a new well. They were quoted $20,000!
11 days! Oh my goodness we were tired after 2.
That's a good idea to keep that water for flushing!
Lana, I have never cleaned the tank only the bowl. Maybe I should? LOL probably. I look into citric acid. thanks for the info!
We’ve been there and done that several times. Good thing you had some water set aside and your daughter was able to give you some too. I keep some on hand for such emergencies too. That is a great tip about filling the tank instead of the bowl, I’ll have to remember that.
Belinda, We are going to fill up the empties today and store them in the garage. At least we will have a start before the next catastrophie!
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