The crazy summer..

Here I am with my kiddies close behind....as most of you know who live near us the weather has just been terrible this summer. One word can sum it up. RAIN.
The summer started out with us heading to Old Orchard Beach in Maine...






We rented a beautiful place(got a great deal) about 10 steps from the ocean but the rain followed us and everyday all day it rained. In all my years going to Old Orchard(over 40 yrs) I don't remember anything like it. On the Wednesday I had emailed my sister who was watching our 3 cats at home to see how everything was going..she indicated back to me..that she didn't want to ruin our vacation but there was tons of rain and loss of electricity back at home and when she went into our home in the morning..there was about 8 inches of rain in our basement. Our basement is the place where our kids spend their time when they are home. Our 2 oldest girls have their rooms down there, our office is down there as well as a small family room. So...needless to say...we packed up and headed home. 8 hours later we arrived home to a house full of people moving stuff and sucking the water out from the basement. The place was a disaster. This was July 2nd. The following days were filled with cleanup and removal of everything in the basement..to see if it could be cleaned, saved or was to be thrown in the garbage. Our sub pumps were changed and finally days later, the basement was being dried out.

A few days later we had another wicked rain storm and when we went downstairs water was starting to accumulate. Oh god....not again. This time it was not the sub pump but coming from the footing of the foundation. We called a specialist in foundations and he came to tell us jaw dropping news...that our french drains around the house were not working and water was just rising around the house. It had no where to go but inside our house. The job that needed to be done was to dig all around the house, remove the old french drains and replace them as well as water proof our foundation so no water would come in again. This job is very expensive and we had quite a time in finding the $$ to have this done. We had to find a way or we could not continue with the re-building of the basement. I didn't want to put in all new stuff, walls, carpet etc only to have water coming back in. So...we arranged something and the job started...





So in order to get the job started we needed to pull down half of our gallery in the back, rip out all our flowers and trees around the house, remove the air conditioning units on the side of the house to prep the house for digging. Our driveway had just been paved in early June(we had been saving to do this for a year) and now we were about the have big machines, dirt and stones all over it. Our walkway had to be pulled up as well during all of this..

Anyways...we had to do what was necessary and the job started. It took about a week and finally the outside of the house looked like a war zone...but we had new drains..yeah!

With the basement flooded we have been confined to basically 1 floor in our house. The girls are sleeping on a blow up mattress in the living room and the stuff that they needed to keep from the basement is all over the place. So my house is a disaster.




The basement was finally restarted once the outside had been completed and now we have gyproc once again, the rooms have been painted and this week the doors and molding have been cut and installed.

Next week the carpet goes in and hopefully by the end of August they will be back in their rooms right before school starts. It has been hard for them as well as they feel they have no place to call their own.

Here are a few shots from the summer:

This was Madison's concert before school ended.








Here are some random shots taken of the kids over the summer:



Colby got his new braces - looking pretty nifty



Presley pondering life...



Presley getting ready to garden..



Jagger and our furr friend Piper..



The boys are starting a yearly tradition of heading out and doing some camping for a couple of days. This summer James took the boys to Morin Heights and they camped for 2 nights and did some zip lining in the trees...the boys loved it.

Here are some pics of their trip:














Kennedy, Madison, Jagger and Colby went to sleep away camp again this summer and had a wonderful time. Cousin Hope joined them as well. They stayed a week at Camp K in the Laurentians.

While they were there we(James, me and Jaden and Presley) headed up to St Saveur for one night and relaxed...credit card here we come...it was not that expensive at all...and we enjoyed our day around the pool and checking out the sites...



We then headed to St Agathe for another night away once all the kids were home..they played on the 80 ft waterslide and had a great time.











After their day in the pool and running here and there they were pooped.



This past weekend we headed to Ottawa for the night to have some fun with my sister and her family and my brother Jason and his fiance Deanna who live in Ottawa. We stayed at a hotel with a waterpark inside. The kids had a blast. We visited the museum during the early part of the day and than waterpark here we came..of course after their bellies were full. So nice to see Jason and Deanna and have a chance to sit and chat. They were excited to share their plans for their wedding which will be on a cruise in 2011..We are hoping to be able to celebrate with them.





So now the summer is coming to an end already...soccer is almost done..the boys are finished, Jaden finished this weekend and Madison is in the playoffs in the number 1 spot. Let's go Maddy. James is her coach and so proud of her and the team.





And now it is back to school....this is exactly how I feel..the kids are not thrilled at all to be heading back..but I remember I felt the same way when I was a kid.



Thanks for checking in...we appreciate you dropping by. My plans of having a few BBQ's and pool parties were thrown out the window...but hopefully with Fall..I will find a great job, James is starting at a new school (5 minutes from home) and the house inside will be completed..how nice does all that sound.

Take care,
Karen