Iowa Floods

I so want to play with some new things, but we have been battling water in our basement. Things are under control now, but I have a lot of cleanup to do. It rained cats and dogs with much thunder and lightening Sun, Mon, and Tues nights. Our daughter found some water in the finished side Mon am. When we got home from work I called every cleanup company in the book and all were busy, so we ripped up the carpet and used the shop vac to cleanup. We then bought a dehumidifier and heavy duty fan thinking that was the end of it. Tues am we had 2 more inches of water. My husband and I both stayed home from work and used the shop vac for 2 1/2 hrs with minimal change in the water level. So we went and bought an 18 gal shop vac with a hose attchment to pump it outdoors. It occurred to us that we hadn't heard the sump pump working, so we bought a new one as well. We got the water out and the sump pump installed, but still had water on Wed am :( I jiggled the pipe connection to the pump and it started working. We quickly used the shop vac and were able to go to work. Wed afternoon we made some minor adjustments to the sump pump and it is working just fine. Thur evening we did some more cleanup in the basement.
Lest I sound like I am complaining, we are blessed to have been able to get most of our items moved before they got ruined, and we still have a home to live in. Many people have it much worse than we do!!! Now we get to paint and recarpet. Might be awhile till we get it all done, but we have our basement back.