Saturday Surprise — Ice Ice Baby…
July 17, 2021
Cryptic enough for you?
So here’s the deal: We have an ice machine in our bar. It was the one thing I desperately wanted to the point that I agreed to forgo a refrigerator with an ice and water dispenser when we remodeled our kitchen (marriage is about compromise, right?) So 2 years ago, our house got hit by a lightning strike and that fried the electronics on my PC hard drive as well as our ice machine. It took the repair place two months to get the parts, and get the thing fixed. Jump to this year and the compressor is shot in this machine. I called 2 appliance places and one agreed to take it, only to call me the day after we dropped it off that they don’t fix residential ice machines. Great. And the other place doesn’t know when they’ll be able to get replacement parts in…
I LOVE my ice machine to the point I thought, screw it, I’ll just buy a new one, and then when the old one is fixed, we’ll always have a spare ice machine. Yes, I am aware that there are ice cube trays, but my freezers are full and the last time I attempted to make ice with trays, the damn things cracked and I ended up tossing them in the garbage.
Herein lies the problem: there is not an ice machine to be had ANYWHERE. I’ve looked at appliance stores across the country! The wait time is anywhere from 10 to 16 weeks, and that’s just a guesstimate from various stores. They can’t guarantee if I buy one that I’ll even get it this year. The other problem is because we built the bar around the ice machine, I got the biggest size (18″) that was offered, so a smaller model isn’t an option as it won’t fill the undercounter space.
Not that I have found a 15 inch icemaker available anywhere either.
We’re in a holding pattern, buying bags of ice, and we did invest in a Yeti cooler since heaven knows how long it’ll be until we have an icemaker again.
IF that had been the only household issue we’d dealt with this week, I probably wouldn’t be so whiny. But our sliding glass door is a pain in the ass to open and Mr. James had to take it out, machine a temporary part that allowed the wheels to even slide. So I have half the inside portion of my glass door leaning against my living room wall. Oh, and the handle to the screen door snapped off, which is something that doesn’t have a quick fix as it is embedded in the actual screen.
And our hot tub is leaking/geysering water, which also forced Mr. James to pull up all the decking around it and try to figure out what the problem is. Once he did that…again, NO parts are available to fix it.
It’s been one of those weeks in homeownerville — anyone else dealing with this stuff?
Share your complaints here if it’ll make you feel better 🙂
LAST WEEKS’ WINNER WAS KELLIE R — email me lorelei@loreleijames.com and we’ll get your prize sorted out. Also, if you won something from me and haven’t received it, please remind me via that email address again!
Since my birthday is next Saturday, I’ll be running gift-aways all week on my social media pages, so be sue to check that out 🙂
Thanks for continuing to visit my blog — I love hearing from all of you 😍
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Jeanine Lesperance said:
Wow, hope things start looking up for you. That is alot for one week
Laura said:
Have you checked Amazon. I just did a search on Amazon and they have several choices.
Leslie Adams said:
We are in the middle of remodeling our home. Lumber prices have quadrupled and my roof has no shingles as my husband and son are trying to repair all the wood, (buildt in 50’s) so we can put our new metal roof on. We were so upset when started taking shingles off, it had 5 yes 5 layers of roofing! So, we continue to grip about it. Good news, my kitchen is waiting til other stuff is done but my old stove quit and we needed new fridge so I did get those an love them both!!!!
kc said:
home ownership; so much fun! I’m trying to find someone to clean the gutters out (little trees growing nicely in there!) and this is on a single story ranch! Also, the folks that I like to use for tree-trimming, etc & there are branches brushing the shingles which isn’t good; their one major drawback; getting hold of them to get down here & give me an estimate & schedule the job! I’ve been trying to get hold of them for almost 2 wks; he said he’d come today to look at the job but no sign of him & no response to the phone call late this afternoon. Ah well…Monday! They do a really good job plus clean up very well afterwards!
Karen H said:
I have had such problems with my house, I made the decision to move into a retirement apartment complex. I got a third floor (top of the bldg) lakeside apartment, and am slowly moving stuff in – want to be fully moved before hard winter sets in. I’m so glad I made this decision. Would rather read your books than shovel snow and worry about frozen water pipes!
Good luck with your issues. At least you have Mr. James!
Angie Malone said:
This is not the year to have appliance problems! Our refrigerator spung a leak
and after the run around of the warranty company trying to blame the plumbing and 5 visits from them, it’s fixed, I hope! Then the dishwasher died and it only took a week to get it sent to the store but it won’t be installed until next month! So I understand!
Jennifer Beyer said:
I hear you about the ice machines! Years ago my siblings gave me one for Christmas. I don’t use it because I can’t stand ice but my family loves it. They’ll never go back to ice trays. Nope. No way! (My fridge broke down during the lockdown so I was force to replace it and the only one available that fit the space in my kitchen has an ice maker so now my family has endless ice!)
Katie said:
I got one off of Amazon and I love it! Hope your week gets better!
Renee M said:
Welp now I must get an ice maker for our camp. Why haven’t I ever thought of this before? Joe’s not gonna be happy seeing another Amazon delivery.
CiCi said:
We spent about $100 at Walmart and got a countertop ice maker. It is 4 years old and going strong. Don’t despair!
Nikki H said:
I want an ice maker so badly! Unfortunately we don’t have room for one any where. I even thought about buying one of the small countertop ones for when we have everyone over. I do appreciate the one in our fridge but my husband today had to chip out the frozen water that had leaked, which had kept us from being able to remove it.
On a different note, when we lived in our old house with our old fridge, the ice maker quit working. He tinkered with it a lot, but we gave up and started using ice trays again. I hated them. Then one night, about 5 years after it quit working, we heard a strange noise. We looked at each other. It sounded like the water had filled in the ice maker. And a while later, we heard the ice dump. AFTER FIVE YEARS. It was so weird.
Laura said:
I’m not an ice fan but I know QVC has a bunch of different ice makers, and they seem to be in stock
Lorelei James Post author said:
Thanks for this option, but those are all countertop models! I need the undercounter model that has a permanent water line…
Mary Preston said:
I own my home and I have discovered that it’s never just one thing that goes wrong. It seems to be a cascade effect.
K. A Bylsma said:
Yes, Mary Preston is correct!
As a homeowner myself, its NEVER one thing at a time!
Good luck!
Jeris said:
Can you check with any closed restaurant property owners to inquire if they would sell any not in use?
Maritza said:
A few years ago my water heater went out (found that out cause water was coming in from the garage into the kitchen, a few weeks later the dishwasher went. 6 months later my refrigerator and microwave gave out. Earlier this year the dishwasher broke we looked for a new one but were told they are all on backorder, no manufacturing and lots of people remodeling due to covid. Luckily my hubby is a Mr. Fixit I found the part he fixed it.
Karen Harbur said:
I feel your pain 😞 on June 4th my 77 yo mom was told by the new Mobile Home park owners that the fence and back porch she’s had for almost 30 years is no longer acceptable with the new park standards, she had until July 1st to meet the new requirements. I spent 3 weeks on porch.com, angi’s list, homeadvisor. com, home depot and lowes trying to find anyone that wanted to remove and replace the fence and porch. I received 1 call back and had to pay 2500.00 labor and 2700.00 materials because I didn’t have any other options. That wiped out my savings again because she’s on SSI and I’ve been unemployed since my husband passed in August, I’m not eligible for unemployment benefits because I moved to CA to take care of my mom. I hope you’re house repairs are handled quickly and I hope we all have better vibes coming soon.
Tessie Tavares said:
Thankfully nothing is breaking in my house right now but it’s always multiple things at a time. I have my nieces and nephew because my brothers AC has been broken for a week. They fixed it once but the next day it broke again…. its been 110 or so everyday.
Nicole said:
I feel you pain. My roof is leaking and we have rain almost everyday lately. It’s slate so no one will return our calls when we ask for quotes to replace it with standard shingles (can’t afford slate). The washing machine keeps throwing codes and hubby keeps telling me he will fix it but he had shoulder surgery so who knows when that will happen. Van is busted and again hubby tells me he will fix it. WHEN is my question???
Heather said:
Oh no, that sucks!! I’ve got some other kinds of issues. I bought a fixer upper 3 years ago, have been slowly doing thing on inside during winter and outside on summer. With the shortage on everything some things are impossible to find! I’ve got siding for my whole house that’s in my garage but I can not afford to buy the damn supplies I’ll need!! I can not wait for price on lumber to return to normal!! My bedroom has no interior walls 🙄. My current situation is flat sheets thumb tacked to ceiling for my wall. The joys of homeownership, I feel your pain!
Monica said:
Can relate. During Covid we had to have the repairman out to look at the oven/digital display (3rd time it died), the dryer and the light in our 1 year old fridge. We also had the plumber out for our garbage disposal. The fridge light was $300 to replace, the digital display was $500 and there was nothing wrong with the dryer (it died the next day😡). He proceeded to charge me $300 for doing nothing in 30 minutes and never gave us an estimate. I went right out to Lowe’s and bought new appliances. The fridge light can remain out. This took weeks to get in.
Linda Holmes said:
We are in for another week of hot weather this week. My dad does not lower the air conditioner to where it is cooler upstairs where my husband and I sleep. When it was hot before it felt like it was 90 degrees upstairs, it was worse with the humidity.
So I kind of go to bed with the windows open to just have some air.
My dads washing machine keeps acting up and I have noticed water on the floor, my husband and I don’t want to by a new one because we don’t want a stackable not sure if there is room for 2 machines, but we won’t be leaving here that long will be moving to AZ in about 1 1/2 to two years or sooner.
Linda
Michelle Holden said:
Damn, when it rains it pours. The ice maker in my fridge broke a couple years ago, I buy a bag from Sonic weekly (I love the ice pellets) it’s the best $3.24 I spend a week. Yes I could buy an adaptor for my fridge, but that ice is so good.
Ellen Bartel said:
Ugh, sounds like you’ve had some week 😔. Fortunately I have no complaints this week, I am on vacation in Alaska! Well one complaint, I have to take the long flight back home on Monday. As I lay here in bed it is 11:10pm and the sun just set. Of everything I’ve experienced here I will not miss the “midnight sun”, I do not like it being so light at night. Also the mosquitoes, they can burn in hell 😅
Ruth said:
Man, I sure hope you get a break on the Homeowner
PITA. Stay strong and enjoy the Rest of your Summer!
🌹🦋😎🌷🦋⭐️🌹😎🦋
Diane Amato said:
Well Elsa came to visit the east coast and dumped 6 inches or rain. My husband woke up for work and found water dripping from a light in our kitchen. I ran out to help with my granddaughter and when I got home about 2 hours later (when the rain started to really come down) water was dripping from another light. Needless to say we need a new roof!
Moran said:
Sorry to hear you are having so many problems with things breaking at your house.
Sending positive thoughts and hoping you’ll find a new ice machine and fix the glass door and hot tub.
My birthday is next Monday and I’m finally taking some days off from work so I’ll have a 5 day weekend 🥳🥳
Linda McBeth said:
These comments make my life sound like a picnic. The ice maker in our refrigerator isn’t working but we rarely use it so I haven’t dealt with it since our daughter gets married in 20 days and our house looks like an explosion hit it. I’m still trying to get through boxes of my 90 year old Mother’s stuff that came out of her assisted living apartment when I had to move her to Long Term Care (LTC) during tax season. It didn’t help me when the IRS moved the tax deadline back to May 17 this year, less time to get through the boxes before the wedding. I go see my Mom in LTC everyday (she won’t be here forever) and have had a lot of other things (like medical appointments) getting in the way of getting through the boxes. I’m thankful that Mother “graduated” from Hospice in May and, at this time, it looks like she’ll be able to attend the wedding.
Bobbie Sue Kearse said:
Ice is the best. I love a good ice water in the summer
Elisa A said:
Sorry to hear about your appliances woes. Homeownership is always fraught with one thing after another.
I don’t want to jinx anything here, so I’m not going to say anything about my appliances.
However, we’ve been fighting internet issues for the last 4 weeks. It’s been cutting out, sometimes for just a few seconds, other times for up to 20 minutes at a time. My husband, who is an IT guy, started tracking when and for how long we lose internet connection. In the meantime, he’s rechecked all the connections and replaced the router and other things. Last week, we lost internet 240 times in 3 days. Ugh. So with his data collected, he contacted out service provider. He was told that the issue was time of day usage is higher during specific times and we could expect it to cut out during those times. Whaaaat!? Since when? It’s been fine all during CoVID when all of our neighbours have been locked in their houses! This only just started 4 weeks ago! Plus, most of those times when we lost service, it happened between midnight and 6 AM. Not exactly busy time, unless you consider guys and their girly sites! We do have a lot of male teenagers in our neighbourhood.
Anyway, we are still struggling with intermittent internet service. It sucks! That’s my complaint of the week. Thanks for listening, Lorelei!
Happy Birthday week!!! 😎🤠🐴🎈🎁💜🎂🍻
Pamela Gomes said:
I feel your pain on that sliding glass door. We had so many problems with ours that I almost wanted to smash it with a hammer. We’ve temporarily fixed it by spraying graphite into the track.
My current frustrating situation is the vast number of broken drawers. Our home was built in 1989 and all the cabinetry is original to that time. Every cabinet in the bathrooms and kitchen have broken drawers and it drives me nuts.
We have fixed some of our broken things, like changing out the front door knob (that was fun to do). Our biggest bone of contention is the kitchen and that battle will not be done for a long time.
Have fun finding things, my dishwasher replacement last fall was only possible because one was in stock after being returned.
Happy birthday to all of us having birthdays this week.
Angie said:
My appliances and plumbing seem to be okay at the moment (knock on wood), but that’s only after management of my free rental (my grandparents lived next door to my parents, so now I live in my grandparents’ house that is in my parents’ name) fixed the leak in the cold water line under the kitchen sink. The super had to pull up all the flooring, and it took days to dry the 2x4s that were used instead of plywood as a subfloor. He still had to cut some bits off and try to sand others to try to get it flat again. But now I got rid of a bunch of furniture I didn’t need along with getting some beautiful new blonde bamboo flooring!! It matches my bathroom floor perfectly!! Happy Birthday Lorelei!!
Suzie said:
Isn’t it amazing how the “little” things in life can upset us the most!?! To others an ice machine is blah. But to you it is next to war and peace (not the book). I feel your pain. I work at an adorable retail store and we don’t have a clue what Fall and Christmas items will be delivered plus companies are charging 8% more for costs added onto them. Think the ship Ever Given. Yet on the home front, I live on a lake. It has been a wet summer so mosquitos are abundant and I’m not tan enough.
Reality is Perception. My reality is I want tan legs, Lorelei’s reality is she wants some ice maker parts. What’s yours?? No judging here.
Sonya F said:
Yes, I’m right there with you. Tried to replace frig, stove, & dishwasher the first of January. They said we will have to order them & it would be 6-8 weeks. We received the frig in about 4 weeks but all the other appliances were back ordered again & again & again. Finally, my husband went to another store & purchased the other 2 appliances. He installed them himself. The oven was too large for the space but was the new standard size. ( The old one was 21 years old.) He had to cut my Corian counter tops to make it fit. I trust him but I was still apprehensive. Everything turned out great though!!
The next week our dryer stopped drying. He takes it completely apart, cleans it, & replaces the drying element. It still doesn’t work! He ends up having to drive an hour away to get a new dryer!
Now our bridge is washing away with all the rain we’ve had since spring. We just got it paved a year ago & yes they will have to remove the part that goes over the bridge. It’s not going to be a cheap fix!!!