The other morning my family awoke to a nightmare! Our newly finished basement was flooded 😣!
This rain storm affected so many people in and around our community. Some people with as much as 5′ of water in their basements.
Thankfully we did not have that much. We did however have enough to affect everything in our newly finished basement.
I was waiting until we finished upstairs to figure out all the “little things” like hanging photos, putting up shelves, building the kids homework station, organizing the book shelves. So literally all of our kids belongings… were under water. Family photos, photo books (the kids love looking at them before bed), pieces of art from when I was a child, canvases, hand made items from family etc. Some things that have SO much value, but maybe can’t be replaced or how could you put a value on it.
What really hurts is we JUST finished the basement. My hubby went room to room and completely redid the rooms with new insulation, drywall, flooring, trim, fireplace. Going room by room to minimize the disruption to our family, especially our children. We had it set up perfectly with plans literally in the works for how we were going to organize down there. A project I was going to take on with hubby’s guidance after the kitchen was finished (which is beginning this week)!
Sometimes life stops you in your tracks and says nope we have other plans. Challenges are so incredibly hard at times when it involves change. Change is hard for me. The basement the first time around was very hard on me and it was a room at a time. This is heavy. Very heavy and incredibly emotional. After all of our hard work our basement has to be completely gutted! Completely – not one room at a time! Thankfully when we were renovating we invested in some upgrades that actually helped minimize the damage in most rooms.
It’s been a very upside down weekend. I have had to be ok with being vulnerable. OK with letting people help me, this is actually quite hard for me. I have to be ok with the unknown and letting go. I have to be ok with change.
So instead of finishing off our ‘whole home renovations’ with our main floor renovations with all new floors, kitchen and mudroom… we now move back to completely redo the basement… again!
In the middle of the night, early Sunday morning, the stress of the situation took hold of me and I was having some painful stomach pains. Stress typically affects my body in a physical way. Being soothed by my Digest Zen Touch and then after lunch boosting it up with Geranium, Ginger, Peppermint and Digest Zen/ZenGest. Sleep and my oils and I am beginning to feel better.
A drop of each in some Fractionated Coconut Oil and I felt wonderful calming, soothing relief.
It’s heavy. We were nearing the end of our whole home renovations. I realize we are lucky and I’m in no way thinking our situation is the worst, but it’s a loss and after all our hard work, it’s feeling very heavy.
Of course there are positives, that I remind ourselves of many times. We are safe. Our structure of our home is safe. What we invested in for the basement were very smart choices. We can begin to live with even less “stuff” simply because right now we are literally in half the amount of space! We can give back by donating what we can’t use at this moment or that was getting a bit tight on the kids. The kids can spend the summer bonding even closer sharing the same room to sleep in. Movie nights just got a lot more fun to be cuddled on their beds all together in the living room. LOL however we can be positive in the situation the better for me and my own mental health. Having previous challenges with depression I have learned I need to listen to my body. Yesterday afternoon without a doubt in the midst of the ‘waiting for the next step’ we all had to rest.
What this has also taught us is to be appreciative and proud of our hard work. We had been holding off to “share” our transformation until it was all done, all the finishing touches, but you know what that doesn’t matter. Life throws us these curve balls and there will always be an opportunity for growth. I am so proud of my husband and the work he’s put into our house to make it our home. 💕 Although much of his hard work was under water, it is repairable. As much as this hurts my heart that we are going to be in reno mode for even longer, I can adjust to change and our new way of living for right now.
The mildew smell is already quite prevalent and our diffusers have been running almost non stop! Yesterday afternoon a great one not only for helping with the odour but also for cleansing negative energy from the space.
2 drops each of white fir, lemongrass and Frankincense. Both frankincense and white fir providing grounding and stability.
We now move forward to rebuild and vow to our children it’s going to be better than ever! A somewhat backwards approach to truly decluttering and purging our home, however this is what we’ve been dealt and we CAN and will handle it!
Your Life As Art Essentials 