Monday Morning Musings - Plumbers Crack

A couple of days ago I went to check on Addy who was supposed to be sitting on this time out bench. This is what I found. She arranged some shoes under this blanket to make it look like she was under the blanket on the time out bench.

Aubrey has this obsession with clock math. It is this game she has made up in her head. Whenever she looks at a clock to see what time it is, she makes the time a math problem. And she can do it for any time. So say it is 6:17. She will say, "It's six seventeen. Seven minus one is six." Or if it is 5:15 she will say, "It's five fifteen. Five times one is five." She really literally does this every single time she looks at the clock.

So we watched Lord of the Rings (all 3 movies) with Zac and Emily a few months ago. They had never seen the movies. Well now they are obsessed. And they have Aubrey hooked on them too. Emily can do a near perfect Smeagol/Gollum imitation. You should ask her to do it for you. She does the part where he is arguing with himself. She's good.

And Aubrey, she is now in love with Legolas. Which I think is cute since she is quite elfish herself.

We have this spider book that we have had since Zac was in Kindergarten. It shows real pictures of spiders. I think it is an awesome book. Spiders can be really beautiful. But for some reason it totally freaks Zac and Addy out. Like FREAKS them out. The book had been stuck on a shelf for years but someone got it out a few weeks ago and for several days it just kinda floated around the house. If it was in a room, Addy would freak out and refuse to go into that room. I finally had to throw it away because it was making me so crazy.

So I was making smoothies the other day. Addy asked if she could push the buttons on the blender. I said sure. Emily got all huffy and said that last time I made a smoothie she had asked if she could push the buttons and I told her no because she was already pushing buttons. I have absolutely no recollection of this.

We celebrated Aubrey's Birthday a few weeks ago. We had balloons. I hate balloons. They freak me out. I fully blame it on my Bishop when I was like 5 years old who told a story of a boy who choked on a deflated balloon. So I pop them as soon as I can. I let the kids play with them after the party since they were still floating. But the next day when they were on the ground, I popped them and threw them in the trash. OK, really I didn't pop them because that could potentially send little pieces of chokable matter flying all about the place. So I rip a little hole by the base of the balloon with my teeth and let the air out and then stuff the empty shell way down in the trash where the kids can't see it. Well, I did this to the balloons from the party. Addy realized her balloon was missing. One of her older siblings, who is on to me and my balloon popping ways, told her that I had probably popped it and thrown it in the trash. Even though I tried to deny it, she wasn't buyin' it. Especially because her siblings were backing her up. So she says to me, "What would happen if you were a kid still and YOU had a balloon that you really liked and wanted to play with and what if I took your YOUR balloon and I popped it? How would you feel???" She paused to let me think it over, then continued, "Well, THAT'S how I feel!" About 10 minutes later she came back with her hands on her hips and said, "I'm seriously mad at you!" That's fine with me. One of these days she will thank me for all the times I saved her from choking on a balloon.

Zac. The kid has now outgrown 3 (T-H-R-E-E) sets of church clothes in the last year. I'm serious. I bought him a new white shirt and black dress pants right before we went out of town in November for Thanksgiving, and they don't fit him now. I think I am going to start some type of "Church Clothing Exchange For Teenage Boys" in our ward. It's crazy.

The other night we were watching American Idol. One of the songs that a contestant was singing has been sung by President Obama at some something or other. So they showed a clip of him singing it. Addy said, "DID YOU SEE THAT!?! The United States Government was singing that song!" She thought it was so funny.

So it's like this. My dishwasher is a piece of poo. We have lived in this house for 3 1/2 years (it is brand new to the house) and I have already had to have someone come out and replace the motor once. Thankfully it was still under warranty. Well, it stopped working again. Last summer. For real. We have been washing dishes by hand since. last. summer. Well, it's more like we have been letting dishes pile up on the counter until there is no more room, then we wash them, since last summer. Finally last week I had had enough. ENOUGH. I called a repairman out to fix it. I wasn't too awfully impressed with him.

First of all he told me that he couldn't determine what was wrong with the dishwasher. That it could either be the control panel or the motor. He said that they don't make this type of dishwasher where you can take apart the motor to see if it is bad, you just have to replace it. But it could be that we replace that and find out that it wasn't the motor, it was the control board and then we would have to replace that too. And for what it would cost to do both of those, we would be better off buying a new dishwasher. Then he told me that my garbage disposal has a crack and needs to be replaced. He said that for a smaller horse power disposal than what I have now, it would cost $350 to replace. (Let me just say again - This house is 3 1/2 years old! We have a dishwasher that has broken down twice, a disposal that is cracked, and a doorbell that we have replaced once already when it almost burned the house down and now the new one is not working. Can we not make anything to last nowadays???)(For reals!)

So I begrudgingly scheduled him to come two days later to replace the disposal. I told him I would have to think on the dishwasher. Since the dishwasher has been broken, I have had this hankerin' to take it apart and see if I could solve the problem myself. But I had no idea how to do it or if I would electrocute myself or what. So I haven't. Well, my mom was over for dinner that night and she said she had just watched a video on pintrest of a girl who took her dishwasher apart and fixed it when someone had told her she would have to get a new one. And I thought, "By golly! If some chick on the internet can take her dishwasher apart and fix it, so can I!" So I did! With the help of a five year old.

We took it apart, cleaned the motor (which I've heard isn't made to be taken apart) and all the other pieces. Amazingly we were able to put it all back together and didn't have any screws left over. (Next time I will take a picture of each layer as I take it apart). And it works! It makes a horrible noise and it leaks a little, but it works! I still don't use it because of the noise and the leakage, but I know now that it is NOT the control panel, it is the motor. I googled the brand of dishwasher and motor problems and found out that I can buy a new motor for about $70. And I can probably install it myself, seeing as how I took the other one apart.

I also got up under the sink and looked at the garbage disposal and saw that there were only 2 screws holding the thing up there. I was feelin' so handy I thought, By HECK! I can probably fix that there disposal myself. So I googled again and found that the type of disposal he was going to give me retails at Home Depot for $90. And I watched a video on Youtube of a guy replacing a disposal and it took him all of 5 minutes to remove the old and install the new. SAY WHA??? Yes, apparently this appliance repair man was charging me $250 for 5 minutes of labor.

So I called him up the next morning to cancel my appointment to fix the disposal. I was nice and just said we had changed our minds. What I really wanted to say was, "MY 5 YEAR OLD AND I TOOK THE DISHWASHER APART AND FIXED IT AND SINCE THAT WAS SOMETHING YOU COULDN'T HANDLE, I DON'T WANT YOU TOUCHIN' MY DANG GARBAGE DISPOSAL! THE 5 YEAR OLD AND I WILL HANDLE THAT AS WELL! THANK YOU VERY MUCH!"