A Home in Process: Rocks, Dirt and Water

Well, we've had quite the week.

Last Saturday we decided to do this:

+ This

X 2 trips

+ a 1/2 ton of 2" Ozark rock to fill in the bare areas around the fountain

= A very tired husband (Love you!!)

So, what did we do?

We had been trying to figure out what to do with the ugly back side of the water pump and Josh had the great idea to build a "well" to hide it.

Here he is leveling the area.

And measuring to make sure everything's even.

Layer by layer...

He did most of it, but I did step in to help. It kind of makes you crazy trying to fit together oddly shaped rocks.

We're still debating what to do on the top, but here's a current picture.

Don't mind the piles of extra rock all over the place.

I think it turned out nicely. Notice ALL the heavy rock my strong husband so kindly loaded and unloaded and moved and placed for me : ) : )

Here's the back so far. I planted that lovely river birch and Josh built the moss stone wall. After some arranging and rearranging, it's nearly done. To the left, we'll build a single layer edger out of the remaining stone and I plan to fill the slope with a butterfly garden.

This is when the story gets interesting...

After working on this all weekend, we sent the kids down to the basement to play and we hear, "MOM! DAD! Everything's wet!"

Flooded.

Ughh...

So we spend all week pulling up carpet, cutting out pad, running fans, emptying the dehumidifier and trying to figure out why the water got in in the first place.

I didn't get wet pictures, but the water came in from the corner and was pooled in the middle there.

It was also flooded on the far end and amazingly our stack of framed pictures was just elevated enough to avoid getting soaked! In a future post I'll share what I'm doing there on the right ; )

Josh disassembled and cleaned out this completely clogged downspout, then quickly built up the soil grade (which was sloping toward the house) and diverted the water further away. He intends to run it underground to drain into the pond eventually. I bought this handy waterproof box to house all the electrical cords that run to the pump for the waterfall. Sooo much less obnoxious than the huge, ugly hose reel box it was sitting in when we moved in.

A few days later when it rained again that side of the basement stayed dry, yay!

But the front side didn't, boo : (

So today we (mainly Josh) moved back all the rock in the front and regraded so it was sloping away, instead of towards, the foundation. The problem was you couldn't really see that the soil was graded toward the foundation until you moved the rock off, so we didn't really know. : /

Yep, all that rock.

This was especially nice... They had filled this gap along the foundation with rock, providing an easy path for the water to find it's way to the basement.

Josh planted 2 more shrubs to fill in the hedge while the rock was moved, as well as rerouting the drain spout to run down the driveway. Stay away from our foundation! I have plans to make this area much prettier, but for now I'll be happy with a dry basement!

So, now we wait to see if everything stays dry through the next week of forecasted rain. Sometimes home-ownership is not very fun...

Josh also recently installed this light fixture I had had my eye on for awhile. The ugly, white, faded, run-of-the-mill one needed to go.

I planted some of my mom's hostas (or pastas as Haleigh calls them ; ) under the front tree and bought 2 adirondack chairs (just the cheap ones) for that elusive moment when we actually get to sit and watch the kids play. I have big plans for a terraced shade garden to address the muddy yard, but my little "pastas" will have to do for now.