$8,000 Mistake

Back in January we decided to take a cruise with several couples from our Church. It was the Christian Music Boat Cruise and I highly recommend it. The night before we were to fly out I was buzzing around the house trying to pack, clean house, wash clothes and complete fifty thousand other things before leaving my sitter at the house with our three beautiful children.
Two years ago when we built our house I had BIG FUN picking out everything for the kitchen! I skimped in some areas, but not my kitchen! One of my all time favorite appliances is the stand alone Ice Maker!!! We never have to buy another bag of ice again! And I made sure we got the cute petite cubes, because I love to crunch ice!
Well, back to running around at 10PM packing and folding for our big cruise…
I noticed that the ice maker seemed a bit slushy, so I pulled out the machine and could not see anything and pushed it back under the counter. WELL, little did I know that we had a copper water line running to the machine that tugged when I pulled it out, then kinked when I pushed it back into place. It appeared to start draining, but not fast enough. By then Husband was in on the act and He pulled it out to see
back there… When he did we “Un-kinked” the copper wire and water started going everywhere. We just starred at each other like a Deer-in-the-headlights. “Oh, My Gosh, what do we do? How do we make it stop? Do something?”
Need I go on? You get the picture!
Now we sell cars, not plumbing! We do very little handiwork and even less manual labor. We did not have a clue what to do. I ran to the back bedroom to get as many towels as I could carry (which was plenty mind you; I had been doing laundry for three days straight). We start sopping up water shouting at each other “I don’t know, Oh my Gosh…”
Finally husband says there has to be a turn off at the street. Now we live on six acres, in the city limits, but very few neighbors. Husband’s first reaction was to call the 70 year old man who installed all the plumbing and I actually looked up the number and called his house. Fortunately the old man was wise enough not to answer the phone or could not hear it one. Next act was to call MIL house and ask what to do. She sent her husband over with a shop-vac at 10:30 at night.
When we bought this property there was a house that was about 75 years old that we razed. (How do you like that new spelling bee word I just used! ). Once Husband got down to the street he realized he was going to need some tools to turn the old crank and lever. Meanwhile I am standing in the kitchen with my finger over the snapped piece of copper pipe “trying” to stop the water from ruining the eight inch walnut hardwood planks I so carefully picked out just two years ago. Need I say anymore than I was unsuccessful?
At this point we ran out of towels and the water was starting to drip down an air vent? Since I am fairly creative…I took off my PJ bottoms and built up a dam! I was so proud standing there in my undies saving my air ducts from water damage!

Once MIL husband came over and was able to help get water turned off at the street we were “good.” Despite the fact that I had used every clean towel in the house, there was not any running water in the house and we were due to be on a plane in less that 12 hours with a 23 year old sitter left to keep our children and fix our mess while we were on a cruise - WE WERE "GOOD"!
Husband crawled under the entire length of the house to get under the kitchen, to get to the shut off valve. He had to turn the water back on at the street (ordeal) to then realize it was still running to the ice make. He then turn the water back off at the street (ordeal)…now to get to the part where I want to save you $8,000.00 if this ever happens to you!
Every appliance in your kitchen that has water running to it, has a turn off valve UNDER THE KITCHEN SINK. I do not care if your house was built in 1912 or 2005, you have a separate valve for your refrigerator, hot water dispenser, dishwasher, ice maker…you name it, it has a cut off valve. Look under there today, check it out, get familiar with them, it may save you $8,000. Really it only cost us the $1,000 deductible, but it took over a month to replace my kitchen floors and carpet in surrounding rooms.

Anyways, the water poured out onto my kitchen floor for about thirty minutes. We had also managed to call another friend 2 miles away to come and share in our happiness. Everyone that came to the house assumed we had gone under the sink first.
Wow, what an expensive plumbing lesson! And I am sharing it free with you!