Everything is BREAKING!

If I could sum up the month of February in two words they would be "everything broke!" Some of it was still under warranty (because we have only been in this country for a year and four months now) but it was nonetheless frustrating to dig through my file cabinet and see if the warranty was 12 months OR longer and then to make phone calls, trips to the post office and function without the items. Here is the list of items the broke and had to be replaced this month.

(1) GPS (the sticky part that suctions to the window fell off and the gps fell down creating a crack on the screen that made it impossible to navigate where we were going). It was discovered that it didn't work while trying to get to a hospital appointment across the city (45 min drive) after pulling all my kids out of school and having no hope of rescheduling the dr. apt. The next day we got a new one and the warranty covered everything BUT cracked screens! (Now there's some fine print for you!)

(2) Girls Bed it is actually our third in a year, it just goes to show that the trundle part of the Ikea beds are NOT jump tested like they say! Luckily this was under warranty but seriously, do you have any idea what it is like getting partly assembled bed bits in your car (with three kids) to then drive to Ikea and stand in line to show the defect? This last time the helper guy was like "are you assembling this correctly because it is your third bed" I was thinking, how can I mess up with directions like these?

(3) DVD player (this is the second time as well (about 10 days apart in breaking). This was also under warranty but it is a 40 minute drive (EACH WAY) to the closest repair place and to drop it off and pick it up is a lot of my time. Plus, it is hard to get things done or maintain cleanliness without the dvd player since we are in an apartment and I can't send the kids outside to play in a yard etc... The only other option to play a dvd is the computer (which we just replaced in November....so I have my reservations). On the bright side, the toll was broken the second time I drove it back, nothing like saving some money!

(4) Air Conditioning (Under warranty again...but it probably shouldn't have been). I have to fill the AC up with water to make it blow COLD air. One day while Mary saw me doing this she decided to help and grabbed something out of the fridge to pour into the AC unit. IT WAS MAPLE SYRUP! The unit breaking was only a matter of time really, but the timing of it all is what made it unbearable. The month of FEB is equivalent to the heat of August in the US which means 40C or 101F. When the AC guy came to check it out he had to order a part which took another two weeks. After two more weeks of heat and limited sleep he finally came to fix it. AND the day he fixed the unit the temperature dropped (and has stayed that way) down to the lower 70's since then...meaning I don't need my AC any more :-)

(5) Vacuum cleaner. I shouldn't count this one because it broke before Feb but I replaced it in Feb so it should count towards my replacement expenses right?

(6) Plumbing-This one is funny. It was actually my neighbors plumbing but none of us in our apt. complex could use our water for a couple days. What was NOT funny was the fact that the pipe that broke (causing the pluming problem) was directly above MY garage (of course). I watched the water spraying out and started thinking,' if this floods my garage and everything in it I am going to be mad.' Then I thought, 'how on earth am I going to haul everything from our college text books to the Christmas tree up 6 flights of stairs before everything is ruined?' I decided to walk away and watch a movie and it turned out the plumbers came just in time!

(7) BOTH cars--and I mean the engine needs replacing! The first car we bought broke down three weeks later. We had to spend three times its value to tow it and fix it only to find out the engine needed replacing. One week later my car (in good condition and just getting old) started smoking and had the same story. This is a dilemma because the registration for my car expires in a week and Stan works out of town during the next week. So I need to go car shopping and I am not doing it with three kids and pushy car sales men. Originally we bought the cars thinking "we just need them to last three years" because that is when our visas run out. But we have ended up spending more in repairs on both than the actual value of the car.....ugh!

In fact, funny story--while driving this month, to get my DVD player fixed my speedometer went down to 0 while driving on the highway. So after dropping the dvd player off I spent the rest of the day paying $400.00 for my speedometer to get shipped out and then fixed, only to have the engine break about a week later!

With that said...we still have our cell phones! Knock on wood right?