A Wee Bit of Craziness!

It has been two weeks since I last wrote and in that time A LOT has happened! Our back yard has been flooding for awhile due to lots of rain and a crack in one of the sprinkler lines. We got it "fixed" in January but the problem didn't go away. Jerry and I have literally bailed 100s of gallons of water out of our back yard. When we finally got it mostly bailed, we noticed another crack in a totally different location. Great! We also noticed that our front yard was also mushy where the water main is. The contractor had never fully turned it off and he broke the turn off valve in the process of the last "fix" but never told us that had happened! We can't get him to call us back ... so our yard will remain mushy until we get a referral from someone else to fix the problem!

The first week or so of November our oven heating element caught on fire and was rendered useless. I was devastated thinking that we wouldn't be able to have turkey for Thanksgiving. A few days later we found an on-line company that sells parts! ....... We got the part and just in time, Thanksgiving was saved. We ordered a few parts for our fridge as well (it had been broken for awhile but we weren't willing to call the Sears's man) and are happy to report that we had success with it also.

For a long time I have been woken up in the morning by the oven timer. It works for me because I have to actually GET UP to turn it off. It solved the problem of me falling asleep again after turning off previous alarm. Last Saturday morning came like any other morning the kitchen timer sounded and I got up to turn it off. I actually decided to set it for another hour as I had been up multiple times with sick children and I was tired. I reset it and then began to walk back to my bedroom. Before I even reach my room in our tiny house a loud and persistent beep sounded! I went back in to see the timer flashing -F1-. I pushed clear/off, reset - but nothing changed, it just kept blaring and flashing F1. I pushed every button possible and even tried to reset the timer for a different time. Nothing changed! Jerry stumbled into the kitchen to see what was going on and tried to "fix" it himself. He was unsuccessful also. Finally he went outside and turned off the power to the oven. We waited a bit and then switched the power back on hoping that the error would have reset itself. Nope! The beeping started again and the -F1- messages mockingly flashed as before. We turned the power off again and searched through the owners manual (lucky for us the previous owners were very organized. They gave us receipts and manuals for every improvement they made in the 27 years they lived here.) The manual didn't help a bit so we began to search on line and make phone calls all over. The answers were dismal - the part is no longer made, no one local fixes it, if it does get fixed by someone others had found that the problem returned rather quickly....! Jerry finally found a place that said they might have a part for him. He quickly got dressed and raced to pick it up. He called me on his way home to tell me it wasn't the right part. Bummer! He searched more on-line and decided to send it off to a company that fixes parts and had good reviews. I will let you know "the rest of the story" when we get the part back.

It has been fun and well not so fun to live without a stove or oven or microwave. We have gone over a week now and I have to say that we eaten a lot of foil pack meals, grilled all kinds of things, and eaten a lot of sandwiches and tortilla wraps.

Here's the video showing our part! Will it be resurrected or will it RIP?