Well, things are finally starting to thaw out a bit here…but with the thaw came the revelation that we have a water line break. The copper piping running from our mudroom out into the courtyard and finally to the guest house burst wide open, with about a two inch gash that has peeled back out of the piping. Thankfully we noticed the water running down the courtyard early on and shut everything off. But all the water in the house has to be shut off since we only have the one main shut-off valve (something we are finally going to remedy this weekend).

So I’m sitting here now waiting for a plumber to show up. They are all extra busy today since about 5 of the main water pipes in the next town over burst…not to mention lots of individuals are noticing that they also have burst pipes of their own. I’m sure these plumbers are really going to make a killing today. I just hope they’re not going to charge us an arm and a leg for this visit…

UPDATE 6:00pm:  The plumber was here…two young guys from the company Hotz. Didn’t take them long to repair the pipe but they were skeptical about how long it might hold since there is still no insulation around it and the pipe doesn’t go very far underground here. Not that it would matter since it’s not the part underground which was the problem…it was the stuff in the wall. So we’ll see. I stuffed some more insulation in the hole outside and a bit from the inside too, then set a radiator over there by the pipes where they run outside from the mudroom. We’ll just have to pray that it won’t freeze again in the next little while. Otherwise Stefan may be doing the replacement himself next time…but at least I can suggest how to go about it 😉