Month: December 2017

One more day

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If all goes well, we have only one more day without hot water!

The plumber called me back this evening. Turns out he is out of town. After asking me some questions – including if we had any hot water right now – he said he could come over tomorrow!  He won’t reach The City until mid afternoon, where he will pick up a tank for us and collect what he needs to install it. Then he will give us a call before heading out.  Hopefully, he will be here around 3 or 4 pm.

Thank God CPP payments come in early at Christmas, or we would have to wait another week or two.

Getting the new tank in is going to be a challenge. Thankfully, he remembers this place and has an idea of what to expect.

Also, he takes payment by eTransfer. Which is cool, because we have no checks left.  Actually, I think we do, but I’m not sure what box they are in.

Speaking of boxes…

I am 99% sure we are missing some boxes.  The girls are unable to find some things, just as I have not been able to find my giant stock pot.  While we have not unpacked everything, we have at least opened all boxes and bins.

We were the last drop off, so the truck was empty when they unloaded our stuff.  It might be possible that a couple boxes went with one of the other two drop offs before us, but items have colour coded tags, so that’s unlikely.  They were not left behind in our old place.  So if they got lost somewhere, it is most likely to have been when our stuff was put in or out of storage.

Two provinces away.

But until we unpack more, there is still that 1% chance we just haven’t found them yet.

And it will likely be weeks before we reach the point where I can say I’m 100% sure.

Frustrating.

The Re-farmer

We have a tree… sort of

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Since it doesn’t look like we will be able to put up even one of our little trees for Christmas, I made do.


Featuring our newest decorations from my wonderful friend.

Merry Christmas!

The Re-farmer

Some progress

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Today was another day to work on packing the kitchen.  Including a whole bunch of canisters on the counter, most empty, but some with food in them.  I don’t know how many years they were in there, but in one of them, the canister was starting to rust into the sugar. 😝

Tomorrow, we will have another load for the shed, then the cupboards can be cleaned.  Then we can unpack our own kitchen stuff.

Hopefully, we will finally find my giant stock pot.  That thing is big enough to brine a whole turkey, with room to spare.  You’d think something that big would be easy to find!

We did end up keeping quite a bit of plates and bowls, since we had to get rid of almost all of ours.  With the cramped layout of the kitchen, those will go into shelves outside the kitchen.  The plan is for the kitchen to only have pantry items, food and cooking tools, so much as possible.  With the counters as empty as possible.  Soon, I might even have room to use a slow cooker!

It’s amazing how the most mundane things become exciting when you realize just how much you use them, and suddenly you can’t.

Speaking of which…

With the hot water totally gone again (we have theories as to what happened, but no way to know for sure), we went over our budget and crunched some numbers.  With Christmas, my husband will actually get a disability payment early, so if we can swing it, we might be able to get a new tank installed before Christmas, instead of in January.  It will depend on whether the guy I called can fit us in.

Some bills will have to wait, but the amount of time and energy going towards heating water every day has got to stop.  Our electric bill is going to be insane.

But, if we are careful, we will be okay.  Not having rent to pay makes a difference.

We still need to consider all those little fees that need to be dealt with, like transferring our drivers licenses and vehicle registration and insurance. Thankfully, those all seem to be cheaper in this province. Still, it’s never the big things that kill a budget.  It’s the little things that sneak up on you, chipping away, a few dollars here, a few dollars there.

Still, we have got by on much less, in the past.  Plus, growing up here, I learned very early, how to make a little go a long way.

That has come in handy, many times, over the years.

That initial rough patch is sure painful, though! 😂

The Re-farmer

An Early Christmas

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With all that’s going on, we have still done zero Christmas decorating.  Being in the middle of nowhere, we aren’t seeing anyone else’s, unless we go into town.

So getting a parcel from a friend today helped bring that Christmas spirit a little closer.

Being the amazing, generous person she is, there was a little something for everyone.  Even the “critters” were included – right on the mailing address!

We had a wonderful time looking through the surprises, from the thoughtful (healing hand cream) to the funny (a Shopkins toy – inside joke on that one!).

I must say, this little game is my favourite.

It has three “take a nap” options.  Which is a needed reminder for our topsy turvy lives right now!

Speaking of which. Still no hot water.  *sigh*

The Re-farmer

The Hand

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I was finally able to get a picture of The Hand.  The Hand is one of the shyest of the cats and was not very happy about me coming closer for a photo.  Food won out, though.

As skittish as he (she?) is, its not quite as much as Squishums, the last of the cats that hang out here, whom I have yet to get an identifiable picture of.

Sometimes, they go onto the roof of the newer part of the house and watch my daughters through the second floor windows.  Much to my daughters’ delight.

The Re-farmer

The Hot Water Saga continues…

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Well, that sucks.

It looks like we’re back to having hot water in the morning, but not for the rest of the day.

We got two showers in before it was gone.

It didn’t come back.

So the top band is working, but the bottom band isn’t.  It seems.  If that’s how it is, we’ll have hot water again in the morning.

Which we can put up with until we can come up with the money to have a new tank installed.

The list of things we’ll need to pay for, on top of catching up on things because of how much the move cost us, is getting very long.

The Re-Farmer

 

More damage

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Yesterday, I managed to unpack a few more boxes the movers packed.

I was disappointed to find this.

This was another situation where they packet had to physically damage something – in this case, break it – to fit it in the box.

This latch hook wall hanging was made by my late mother-in-law.

Then there was this utterly ridiculous find.

Who does this? I realize its just a roll up sheet of poster paper, but it was folded like this and crunched into a plastic bin.

Insane.

The Re-farmer

We Have a Door – and Hot Water!

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My brother has pulled off another miracle for us.

Two of them.

We had plans to go into the city around noon to finally take care of the Costco/pharmacy mess, then a Christmas dinner with my husband’s family.

It was also the day my brother booked to come fix our van door and the hot water tank. Because of our plans, he came much earlier.  Amazingly, he started the day at 5:30 am, took three hours to prepare for everything he could think of (because, once here, there is no alternative if something is missing), then drove the hour and a half or more in freezing rain to our place.

Then he lugged a 150-200 pound door down the stairs into the new part basement to work on.

Our door had a broken latch and couldn’t stay closed.  It happened because of a loose hinge that caused the door to drop.  When closing it, the latch would hit the bar it was supposed to catch on to stay closed.  Eventually, it simply broke. I’ve been driving with a bungee cord hooked onto the window frame to keep the door closed, ever since.  Our garage had tried to find a used or salvaged part for me, because a new one would have cost an insane amount of money, but they were unable to find a salvageable part.

My brother managed it, salvaging the hinge pieces as well as the entire door.

Long story short, he ended up McGyvering the two together.  The frame of the replacement door now has the inside shell of our original door, plus the outside handle of the original door – with the key lock in it – got transferred from the original door, to the replacement door.

This is the original door, with the broken hinge, as well as the broken latch.

It took him something like 5 or 6 hours!!!

Then, as soon as he was done, we headed to the city, while he switched to working on the hot water tank.  It turns out he got the last two of those bands left, not just in North America, but the world!  They haven’t been made in decades, and they were still in the original box.  He wasn’t sure if replacing them would fix the problem, but he was going to try.

We got home less than half an hour ago, and found we have hot water!

Which means, in the morning, instead of sending hours heating water for several people to have baths, we can take 10 minute showers, and get on with out day.

I love my brother.

Update: I just got off the phone with my brother. Turns out only the bottom band needed to be replaced, but the new one was several inches too short. He had to gerry-rig it.  He also found the schematics for the replacement thermostat was wrong, which likely explains the breaker going.

We shall see how the hot water is, tomorrow.  In the end, it’s still a temporary fix until we can get a new tank.

The Re-farmer

Some Fun Stuff

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When the girls were rearranging the shed to make more room, they found the radio/record player console that was a figure in the living room for decades.  Sadly, it no longer works.

Looking inside, there were several records. A couple of 78s and a couple of 45s. I had to rescue them!

Looking at one of the 45s, I started to laugh and sing “Who Stole the Keeshka?”

They thought I was kidding. Continue reading →