It could've been worse...

It was the middle of July when I received one of those phone calls that every homeowner dreads.  The call was from our friend in Tennessee who mows our lawn at The House of Goodwill; we were in New York.

"There's a water leak coming from the house," I was told.  My heart almost stopped; no one wants to hear about a water leak in their home when they are sixteen hours away!

So, long story short, it turned out that the water leak "coming from the house" was actually a water leak outside the house (still not great, but MUCH better than inside!).  There is a hose faucet in the wall outside the house that had quit functioning before we left town.  The hose knob no longer worked; you could only make the water come out by turning a screwdriver in the hardware somehow.  (I say somehow because I don't know how it worked, my husband was the only one who could do this.)

Anyway, we never did figure out what made it start leaking in July, but it did.  Apparently it had been leaking for a while, we were told the garden bed along the wall (with all the bulbs I had planted in it) was flooded with water.

At least it wasn't in the house, right?

So my husband called and explained to our friend how to turn it off with a screwdriver, which he did.

Disaster averted.  (I sure love my Tennessee friends!)

So when we came back to the house in September, we called the plumber for an estimate to fix it.  We figured they could replace the knob that afternoon, problem solved.

But it's NEVER that easy, right?

"$2200," the plumber told us.  $2200!  To fix a knob!  How?

Well, as it turns out, the genius who originally plumbed the hose faucet, mortared the pipes into the rock wall next to the house, five feet below the ground.

And as it turns out, the part that needed to be replaced (because the original was put in almost fifty years ago) is no longer made.  We didn't need just a new knob, we needed a whole new pipe section.  Therefore a six foot hole would have to be dug down to access the pipes on the back of the wall, and the pipes would have to be somehow chiseled out of the rock they were mortared into.

"We don't normally see plumbing situations like this," the plumber said wryly.  

But $2200?  

Here is the original hose knob, mortared into the wall.

The house is built into a hill, so the other side of this fence is all earth.  To access this hose knob, a five-foot deep hole needed to be dug on the other side of this wall.  Of course, I was concerned about the shrub and peony over where the hole needed to be.

"I'm going to do it," my husband said determinedly.  "I'm not paying $2200."  He figured if he could figure out how to install an irrigation system - which he did back at our home/house, and which taught him some basic plumbing - he could handle this repair.

I love it when my husband is the cheap one!  ('Cause usually it's me.)

Ironically, often when my husband declares he's going to do some big project himself that he's never done before (to save money), I'M the one dragging my feet, and wondering if it's worth spending the money for a professional.

But at the end of the day, I'm cheap.  I'm not going to say no.

So here are some pics of how my husband (and my son who assisted), spent the weekend:

It was his first time using an excavator, and I think he enjoyed it!

He even managed to dig the hole underneath the shrub and plants without moving them, so that they never had to be displaced and replanted.

That impressed me! 🙂

He did all the plumbing work in the five-foot hole.

And here's the new hose knob, installed so that any part that may break and need replacement in the future can be accessed right in this front part, no digging needed.  See the intact plants just above?  

They finally finished putting the dirt and grass back together today in the rain.

Job complete!

My husband decided to rent the excavator on a Friday because he'd be able to keep the rental for two days but only have to pay for one.  So for a final cost of around $500 (for hose/pipe parts and the excavator rental) the project got done, saving us about $1700.

I have to admit, the man is good at saving money.  And now that he's refaced compromised drywall AND mastered the excavator, he's probably going to regret it.

Because now I'm pretty positive that he can do anything.  Hmm...what else needs to be done?

And just to be clear, this post is titled "It could've been worse" in reference to the water leak, not the repair job. 😉

Did I mention this man makes dinner for the family almost every night too?  I won't.  It would just be too much...