Rain, Rain, Go Away

I don't have any pictures for this post, but did want to let you know what we did today. When we were driving from church to South Holland my mom called to ask if Pat had old clothes with him - my first thought was 'what project does dad need help with today?' - but she then told me that my Uncle Nick needed help moving things out of the shop and my Aunt Karen was calling the village to get sand and bags for their house.
So Pat went right over there and I waited until the girls and I had lunch and then headed over myself. I knew I wasn't going to be much help moving furnaces so I joined the sandbagging efforts. I had never filled sandbags before - and now I can say I have. We finished the first pile of sand that was delivered and then had to wait for another load to get there. While we waited, people started putting the sandbags around their garage and house.
While we were there, the lake that once was the adjoining parking lot was inching closer and closer to their house. I guess the water had been rising 3 inches an hour, but before we were done it was only rising 1 inch an hour.
The next load of sand arrived - this time it was 2 piles - so we started up again. There was plenty of help so we were able to get them filled pretty quickly. Once we were done we headed to my parent's house for dinner and to rest.
As we were getting closer to our house tonight we could see things were getting worse here. 1st Avenue was closed, Prairie was closed and we could see the water from Salt Creek on Washington. As soon as we opened our back door I knew our basement was not dry. Sure enough our carpeting was all wet. Luckily we did not have any standing water - just really wet carpet. So Pat started, and I finished, using the dry vac to get some of the water out of the carpet. It is still damp, but much better.
The news is saying most of the rivers and creeks have not crested, so we are praying that we don't get more water overnight or tomorrow. Otherwise we will be back downstairs repeating tonights fun times!