the problem with buying things all at once

Busy week this week! When you get married and later buy your first home,
usually the next thing on your handy-dandy to do list is to buy all of your
appliances for your new house (unless of course they came standard). Its
quite nice because you get a great deal on the prices on these things when
you buy them all at once. There is a problem though.

Sometime around your fifteenth wedding anniversary, it comes time to pay up
again as all of those appliances start to die.

This year, we had a washing machine give up the ghost, despite a few repair
person visits. Thankfully someone from church had an old washer they were
not using, and so I was able to use that, until it also died (it was not in
great shape to start but it tided us over). Then the dryer gave up the
ghost, though that was not as urgent--I am able to put the laundry outside
to dry if I must, though I really don't feel like using a washboard to do
laundry for 7 people. After we got the dryer fixed (thankfully not needing a
new one), we knew we had to get back on track saving up for a new fridge,
because that had been misbehaving for a couple of years. We bought it on
clearance, with a no warranty policy, knowing the model was not made for
very long because of some problems they had with it. Still, it was all we
could afford back then, so we did it. Many years, and many more ruined
groceries and expensive repairs later, the fridge finally decided to go out
with a finally bang.

I woke up Monday morning, groggy as I always am in the morning (definately a
night person), poured a cup of coffee, blindly reached into the fridge for
the milk, and started to pour when a nasty smell hit my nose about the same
time I heard "Plop, Plop, Plop". My milk was now solid and smelling like
yogurt left on a hot rock in the sun on a summer's day. I opened the fridge
with my eyes fully open this time, and realized my butter and cream cheese
had both melted down the front door of the fridge, which felt hot to the
touch. The inside of the fridge was warm except for the very back, which was
frozen solid. I was almost afraid to open the freezer. In it, the Ice Cream
we had just bought Saturday Night was encased in frost, and everything
looked frosty in it.

Thankfully, we had been saving towards a new fridge, but we were not quite
ready for this anyway, because we also had a car in the shop. Repair bills
are such an unromantic and unfun thing to spend money on, aren't they? LOL

Monday my husband and I went out and looked around and different Fridge's at
different stores, comparing prices and seeing what was available. After
praying and discussing the matter we decided on a fridge we saw at Home
Depot, with a bottom freezer, and an alarm that lets us know if a child has
the fridge door open too long. It also fits seven gallons of milk in the
door, not that we ever buy that many at once. Still, it's nice.

I went back on Tuesday to Order it. Tuesday I was supposed to go to my
friend Toni's for some sort of home party demonstration for one of those
direct sales companies, and I had a child with a sinus infection still home
and on the couch, but on the mend. So, I decided to leave the kids home with
my teen daughter in charge while I first went to the credit union to
withdraw money from our appliance savings fund, and then on to home depot,
and swinging around to pick up some dinner on the way home for them (a rare
treat!), before heading off to Toni's. I arrived at Home Depot, and there
was a mad rush in the fridge department--five other families were there
buying refrigerators on Tuesday afternoon. A nice fellow who doesn't work in
that department helped me out, though it took a bit longer as he is not used
to ordering these things. By the time I got up to the checkout a full hour
had passed--so much for in and out!

I went through the self check, hoping that would be faster, as everywhere
else there were long lines. Well, as seems to happen when we are in a hurry,
something went wrong. The checkout girl had to key in my order information
by hand for this as I was paying with both a check and the cash from my
emergency account, but accidentally she hit that I gave her four million
dollars instead of four hundred! At first I thought maybe I won a
contest--you know, like the "lucky millionth customer" or something, because
my checkout started to spit out money at me, and the floor soon had tens and
twenties spilling out all over it. Soon, I realized actually the computer
didn't know what to do, or how to give me 3.9 million dollars in change. As
funny as it was, it soon became rather unfunny as they couldn't figure out
how to void it all out, and how to actually ring me up. I was there for
another super long period of time, before my daughter, Ruth, called to ask
where in the world I was (my parting words were, "I'll be back in an
hour"--3 hours ago). I finally just went home, and let them call me when the
succeeded in ringing it all up.

Finally, the good folks delivered my fridge, and hauled away the old one.
The fridge seemed smaller in the store, but this thing is HUGE. the kids all
think it is really cool (pun intended). So far, so good. My milk is still
liquid, my butter is still solid, and no lettuce has frozen in the crisper
yet, so I would have to say, mission successful.

Well, the only thing left is the stove. I better start saving!

Blessings,
Kimberly