Waterfalls and Gutters

The other day we got a torential downpour right before the schoolers got home. I opened the front door and was faced with a Niagra Falls sized waterfall right over out front door. When Tim got home I asked him to look into getting some snap on gutters or something to prevent this from happening anymore. Now I may be a girl and not know much about home repairs but it couldn't be that bad right or expensive right? After getting the yeah yeah sure babe. I decide the next morning after everyone leaves that me and baby girl will at least get the broom and sweep the pine straw off the roof. This is where the fun begins. I get in these moods where I focus on some chore normally its something really crazy..like sweeping the roof.. and I get compleatly focused tunnel like vision. I get the broom, a rake, and a chair to stand on. I forgot that i'm only SLIGHTLY terrified of heights yet here I go, up on a wiggly porch standing on a folding chair trying not to have a panic attack and scare baby girl. I finally get myself calmed down and start sweeping some pine straw off the roof. Brooms are not the tool for this now a rake is!!! MAN the stuff started flying. Baby girl ran and got her um-b-lella and was hiding under it to prevent this nasty stuff from hitting her. I by accident discover that we do indeed have gutters!! However they are PACKED with this..well.. STUFF...so i start digging this stuff out then get the hose and start super spraying.. I can't get far on the drainage gunk because i'm not high enough. We worked for almost two hours on a maybe 12 foot section. The schoolers get home and change into nasty clothes, daddy's safety goggles, bantoonas. We are ready for war!!!!!! The oldest and I get the van close to the house with her on top digging gunk and me sweeping with the rake. hmm.. If only we had a ladder.. WE DO MOMMA!! woohoo!! We find the coolest ladder ever made! This thing can be put in like 30 diffrent positions it is freaking awesome!!! We finally agree to the scaffolding position and climb up using hands and hand tools digging out stuff so nasty that we just laugh about haw many baths we are going to have to take. Until I get the hose to rinse all the loose stuff out. We turn up the hose as high as it will go and shoot the inside of the gutters. Unknown to us a clog has formed right above oldest childs it just starts spilling out nasty gooey crap right on her head.. good thing we have saftey goggles eh? she looked like the swamp monster she was COVERED from head to toe just laughing soaked and wet and sooo disgusting. We finally finished the whole front of the house.. only took 3 hours and several spray offs of the hose. Even better while oldest was on the ladder some neighbor kids we dont like were going past and she "accidently" sprayed them from like 100 feet :) The things we teach our kids. BTW we had so much fun shoveling out gutters we are going to Pookie-Boos house on Saturday and doing his gutters :)