…here are a few more views from our road trip and overnight news!
I could have screamed “stop” every few minutes as we drove on these country roads in Eastern Washington. I love to see these old barns.
I thought of my friend Judy from Mennonite Girls Can Cook and her beautiful blog “My Front Porch” when we passed this sign.
We had dinner with our son at this Mexican Restaurant in Chewelah and we will return here on future trips to this area.
And now for our breaking overnight news…
Appearances can be deceiving! This is our Kenmore Elite 3 door refrigerator manufactured by LG.
Doesn’t she look like a perfect appliance? Pretty on the outside but we are totally in the dark on the inside!
We had quite a frightening discovery last night before we went to bed. I opened the refrigerator and smelled a very strong odor that smelled like electric wires burning. I called Dear downstairs and we investigated further and realized the lights in the refrigerator were not going off when the doors were closed and had produced an amazing amount of heat that started melting the plastic light compartment. With difficulty Dear disconnected the fixture and removed it totally from the refrigerator. We were so glad that we realized what was going on before we went to bed for the night. It could have easily resulted in a fire. The food items that were close to the light fixture were quite hot to the touch.
I think you can easily see the burn marks on the sockets.
If you look on the inside of this plastic light unit you can see all the melting of the plastic. We are in the process of filing reports with consumer product safety commission and talking with Sears on what our next steps should be. We hear that if Sears doesn’t agree to fix this problem as a product defect it will cost us $500 to fix it. We are not sure we want to invest the $500 for this 6 year old unit. I’ve been out looking at new units. In the meantime we are in the dark and we use a flashlight if we need to. But…my refrigerator woes hold nothing to the other news that we received today.
UPDATE: Bloggy friends are the best! Sam from Eastern Washington emailed me with information and a recall phone # for my refrigerator issue and I called and a new part has been ordered and a technician scheduled to come out and replace the part in our refrigerator. We’ll be asking him some burning questions when he gets here! Thanks Sam from Eastern Washington!!
For those of you that are still reading, life has been tough this week for my loved ones and in turn for me . I realized tonight as I made yet another “comfort meal” how hard things in the body of Christ affect all of us. There is joy in the midst of the sorrow but we suffer none the less with those who are grieving. A young man died unexpectedly and my brother’s church community is coming together to hold each other in their grief. My brother will probably perform the service for this dear friend of his sons. We know he is with Jesus but the earthly shock still needs to be absorbed. A little baby girl in the womb is struggling to stay alive and we pray for a miracle that she will survive. Another dear one is losing all her hair after her 2nd chemo treatment and staying brave and trusting in her Lord. So many things to pray about. I said today that our prayer lists are heavy but God is good and I am so grateful that Jesus is our advocate at the right hand of God and the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words…
The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b. 
thankful God allowed you to “discover” the hot fridge. WHEW! Some days you wonder at this gospel of grace that we walk out. His grace is sufficient ALWAYS…but sometimes we feel like the wind has been knocked out of our sails with the struggles and hurts of others. Praying He will be all that you need as you abide with Him through these sorrows and struggles. Praying your break is peaceful and your abiding with our Father sweet!
Being able to say “our refrigerator caught fire” would be a great conversation started. The only topper would be “our oven froze” ?
I’ll add your prayer concerns to the ones that already are being lifted through the day and night. Life is so fragile and the times and circumstances are sobering.
Wow. That’s not good. So glad that you found out what was going on. We are babying a fridge at the moment so I’m taking this as a cautionary tale. Hope that you have some recourse. Six years old is not very old for a fridge.
(We had to buy a dryer this week. Sigh. Second major appliance to go this year and the fridge…praying for a healing.)
How sad for your community with the loss of one so young. It certainly does pull everyone together. May each and every one know the comfort of the Lord. Will pray for the little one and for your friend who is going through chemotherapy right now. It’s all a challenge, though nothing is beyond God’s touch.
Oh Ellen, I’m so sorry to hear that things in your world are being shaken. I’ll pray for the family of the young man and the mother of the wee one in her womb. Life is so fragile, but thankfully the LORD God holds each of us in His hands.
Good thing your sniffer was working well 🙂
xoxo cori g.
Wow – that could have been really bad – had it caught fire during the night! So glad you discovered the problem.
Praying for the family and for your brother as they grapple with the loss of this young life, and for that precious little one too. Also keeping Kathy’s sister Rhoda in my prayers. This sure keeps broken fridges and other inconveniences into perspective!
Bless you as you support these dear people Ellen!
God is our protector…even from faulty refrigerators! So grateful for that! My goodness, you have been entrusted with some serious things to pray about and some hurting people to minister to. I pray that our Heavenly Father will “direct your path” as you do what He has called you to do.
Yes, He upholds us through the griefs. Sometimes we can barely hang on to it, but He is there. So glad you did not have a fire to report today!
Thank you for sharing your dark side of life…and may you soon see some light again.
You’ve experienced quite the tragedies and I’m hoping things can be reconciled with Sears.
Hopefully you will sleep in the dark and find the morning son to greet you early again.
It too will be a new day…!
Life is fragile…handle with prayer. Those are the words that came to me as I read of the sorrows your dear ones are going through this week. Joining you in prayer.
So thankful you noticed your fridge ‘issue’ before it became a major problem!
As for the porch sign (which made me smile)…I have a few antiques at My Front Porch as well. Live ones!
Thankful for God’s protection over you. May he give comfort to your loved ones who are suffering and sorrowing so greatly now. My heart goes out to them….
Oh, Ellen…. I am so sorry to hear! My mind is brought back to the dear friend we lost due to cancer last Christmas Day. But the Spirit reminds me that he is now in a better place, and I need to pray for the needs at hand that you just listed. I will certainly be praying. “Pray without ceasing…”
Hope your refrigerator issue gets resolved soon.
Hugs.
You have a lot going on, Ellen. The the story of your fridge woes, as bad as they are, pale next to the paragraph afterwards. My heart goes out to all of those people who are suffering.
So sorry Ellen – I’m praying for those who are grieving, the wee one and your friend with cancer. My son James just lost one of his friends to cancer – age 28 – another dear friend’s mother just had surgery for cancer yesterday -and a young mom in our church just had a stillbirth. It’s so good to know that though life may feel crushing there is One who can, and does, carry us through.
Glad the fridge episode wasn’t worse.
Wish we could go on a barn photo hunt together 🙂
Sending love
k
Beautiful barn photo. Scary event with the fridge. I wonder how often these things happen? Several years ago we woke up to find the entire freezer of the fridge melted, plastic all folded over on itself. The meat had cooked, it was so hot. We were very fortunate that the house didn’t burn down. Sears did nothing, but were very quick to haul the unit away. Thinking back, we should have taken photos and filed a complaint. I’m glad you are getting your fridge fixed.
Oh my goodness, so glad you caught that problem with the fridge in time! I have such a hankering to go to an old farm and take photos all day long. It would be so fun. And I’m sorry to hear about the troubles your church family is having…time to band together and pray…the effectual fervent prayer availeth much.
Wow, Ellen, I’m glad the refrigerator didn’t catch fire. That’s another reason to always eat something just before bedtime–to check the frig.
I’m sorry for the burdens you are carrying-they bring us to our knees, huh?