This is My Life...Covered in Plastic and Plaster Dust

For those of you who haven't heard the whines on Ravelry or Facebook, let me give you the Reader's Digest Condensed version of my woe. We found out last week that there's a leak in the hot water lines (copper pipe original to the house which was built in 1962) which are buried in concrete somewhere under our house. The options were to dig into the floor and try to find the leak--no guarantee that there were not multiple leaks--replace the hot and cold water lines downstairs, or replace the pipes throughout the house with brand new PVC pipes. Because we only want our house torn to bits one time, and because the cost in price between replacing half the pipes and replacing all of them was not that great, we are getting all new pipes in our house. It's going to cost a fortune by the time we pay the plumbers and then pay someone to come in and repair the damage caused by the plumbers. They are having to tear into ceilings and walls to get to where they need to run the new pipes and to access some of the old ones. It's a freaking disaster in this house right now. There is white plaster-like dust everywhere. Most everything is covered in plastic. Daughter has been displaced from her bedroom because she has a bathroom in there and it's torn apart at the moment.

This is very unsettling. First, we didn't have the money just sitting around for this major repair work. Second, it's Christmas and I want to be cleaning up and decorating for the holiday, not living with plumbers in my house (very nice ones, I must add) and a mess all over. I "wasted my time" yesterday by vacuuming out the sun room, the laundry room, and the downstairs den so that we could have some sort of normalcy around here. The state of semi-clean won't last long. The plumbers are due back bright and early tomorrow morning and likely will be with us the rest of the week. They said that the time consuming part is running the pipes. It took them 2 days to demolish our house. I just hope there's no more cutting of sheetrock or drilling of holes in wood. *sigh*

Thanks to a local friend, I've found the name of someone I hope can do the repairs to the sheetrock. He and his wife both are currently out of work due to layoffs, so I hope that we can get him to do the work we need done. They need the money, and we need the help.

The sheep fencing is currently on long term hold. I'm sad about that, but we need water and no leaks in our house's foundation more than they need a fence. Husband will just have to muck out their enclosure on a regular basis.

I am retreating from the world for a bit until my home and sanctuary are in a more stable place. See you all sometime when the dust settles (literally and figuratively).