That's your problem, it's fused shut.

Everyone,

Back from Utah. Had a wonderful and full time. Juice and Dad and Andrew had a great time in Las Vegas seeing cool electronic things. Mom, Me, Angela, and Butterfly did some girl time. Watched some movies, did some shopping, lunch, etc. Very fun and not something I get to do on a regular basis out here. (Girl hang out time, I mean) Anyway, I also got to spend some time with Laura, Zuke, Dennielle, Jae, Heber and all of our good friends. I even got to meet Kaiden, Zuke's baby, for the first time. He's so cute.

We also enjoyed being able to be with family this time around. We spent the morning with Juice's sister Nanette and her family, and had dinner with all the Ws that night. Also, Butterfly got to her great grandma P. We were also able to take a big family picture of my mom's side of the family. All 32 to of us. I sat next to my Grandpa and as he looked around while everyone was gathered, he asked me how many of us are there now. I told him 32 and he smiled and just said, "Amazing. 32 and no one is missing?" Nope. He then said, "32 and 2 dead and more on the way, I'm sure." He just looked so happy to see all of his family there. Together. I was very amazed myself.

I'm glad to be back home. Even if coming home brings over a week of mail, bills, and problems to deal with. One of our problems is on going. THE DRYER IS STILL BROKEN. I don't know if I've mentioned it but our dryer has been broken since Halloween. Yes, 4 months. We have a home warranty policy that covers the dryer so we went to them first. They pointed us towards a matience company who deduced that our heating element was broken. He ordered the part (which took almost 2 weeks) finally put it in (after playing phone tag with him for about a week) and we had a working dryer. For one load. I put the second load in and turned it on and heard a thunk. Then nothing. It wasn't going. I opened it up and you could lift the drum around in the casing. Not good. So the guy comes back, determines the bracket that it spins on in the back wore down to the point of it breaking (so THAT'S what that nasty squeak was...) and he had to order that part too. Enter the holidays. It took him till late December to get the part. And then when he went to put it in, we discovered when the drum dropped, it broke the heating element in the back. Which is the first part we installed.

So, a recap: dryer doesn't dry. Dryer guy #1 comes out to determine problem. Problem is bad heating element. Dryer guy #1 orders part. Gets part, puts part in dryer. Dryer works for 1 load. Stops working. Dryer guy #1 is called again. Back bracket broken. Brand new heating element broken. Dryer guy #1 is frustrated. I am frustrated.

We went back to the home warranty place and they said that they would have to send someone else out to look at it before they approved a replacement. Or we could take $200 and fix it ourselves. We have a stackable unit. It's over $800 dollars to replace. We opted for the second guy to come and look at it.

Dryer guy #2 comes a few days before Christmas and sees the problems and says he can fix it. He gets the parts in a lot faster than Dryer guy #1, and puts in the new bracket and heating element. Should be done, right? Wrong. The dryer still won't turn on. We have been going to the Laundromat for weeks now. I thought it was hard when I had to carry it all down 3 flights of stairs and down the road like when we lived in Provo. It's 10 times harder when I have to load it all in the car, add the baby and drive there, unload it all and keep Butterfly entertained, etc. What a pain.

Anyway, Dryer guy #2 finally figures out what is wrong with the thing. When the drum dropped, it caused a lot of electricity to go through the dryer. It fused the motor. Oops. So now he has to order that part. Fine, part ordered. He came today to put it in, and it still won't work. Now the thermostat is fused shut and won't regulate the temperature so it gets way too hot and can short out again, catch on fire, etc. Great.

Luckily, he had a different thermostat in his truck so he put that one in temporarily until he can order yet another part. He said in 26 years of doing this, this is the hardest thing he had to fix. He said it haunts him. It haunts HIM? Try looking at it everyday.

Good news is that he got it so it works and I can do the mountains of laundry I have stacked up in my room. Bad news is that he has to come back again. Sigh...

Safire

PS- In the time it's taken me to throw a load in, put the pictures on this and go back downstairs for something, the washer has shut down. Why me?!