Lamps and Water Don't Mix

Even though my lamps are all about water, that doesn't mean that it's a good idea to mix them with with real thing. That's exactly what happened while having the new liner in our in ground pool installed. No, I don't keep my completed lamps at the bottom of my pool. Ok, I admit, there have been one or two that have landed there out of complete frustration because they looked like dog doodoo. (Don't worry, I took off the little animals first so they didn't drown.)

While recovering from sticker shock after finding out what our new pool liner would cost, work began on the project. It's a fascinating procedure, actually. The pool is drained of all it's green gook that's accumulated from being covered all winter. Patches are applied to the bottom with some special stuff after the old liner has been removed. Then they put in the new liner and use a giant vacuum thinger to suck out all the air between the liner and pool walls as it fills with water. So after we get the pool two thirds full, the pool guys come back to check it out and find out that from all the rain we've had, the ground water has come up under the pool and washed away all their repair work. Kudos to them though, because they drained all the water, took out the new liner and started all over again. And did an awesome job, I might add. The problem came in with our pool filter. We had had all the connections to the pool filter rerouted through the heater. Which is kind of funny in itself because we now know the heater doesn't work anyway. Jeez. Anyway, another long story short, during the night one of the connections came loose, spewing nice, clean, expensive water everywhere, draining the pool down about a foot. The filter is right next to the outdoor entrance to our basement where my shop is. The water came out so fast it went over the footer of the Bilco door, down the wall in the stairwell and right into my shop. All my supplies are in lovely, labeled, CARDBOARD boxes - on the floor. Ooooooohhhhh, yes. Need I explain the chaos that ensued? It wasn't pretty. Lots of soggy boxes with soggy supplies. Fortunately, I only lost a minimal amount of supplies so a true disaster was averted.

Do I put this episode into the life "does suck" or "doesn't suck" category? Both, I think. Sucks because it happened at all, doesn't suck because it could have been a disaster but wasn't. The moral to the story? Take your pick. 1) Don't craft if you have a swimming pool. 2) Don't put in a pool if you craft. 3) Don't store your supplies in cardboard boxes on the floor in your basement. I choose #3 and am off to buy plastic containers. Just in case.

Happy (and dry) crafting,

Kathy
http://nnlamps.com