2009 was the year to buy tires for our vehicles. We weren't aware, when the year began, that this was The Year. In August, after sliding around the road during a dangerous thunderstorm, Rob bought new tires for his car. We talked about the van needing new tires "soon" but had no concrete plans about it until I thought about winter and the associated snow and ice.
So we Dave Ramsey-ed it out and on Monday took out the planned-for cash. We even took out more than we needed, and adding that to the money that was already in the Car Repairs envelope, we had nearly $650. Which meant we could buy any tires we wanted. We could have bought an extra set, even, just in case (but we didn't). By Tuesday night the Car Repairs envelope was in a decidedly more humble position and the van was driving smoothly with 4 new, balanced and aligned tires on it. Life is Dave Ramsey Good.
Stove
Buying a new stove has been on our radar for quite some time. Because our stove is pretty lousy. Encouraged by our successful tire planning and purchasing episode, Rob started talking about how long it would take before we could buy that stove. We priced stoves months ago and the one we wanted was about $500. We could probably budget and have that by, what, Christmas? January? It wouldn't take long.
Dryer
And just to show us what He thought about our plans, on Thursday our dryer died. I pushed the button to start it and it didn't start. I pushed it again. Nope. I pushed it down and held it and it buzzed and buzzed, which is normal, and then it clicked like it was shutting down, which isn't normal. Now if you push the button, nothing happens at all. This is fantastic.
I took our two wet loads to R&C's house to dry them and when Rob got home we started talking about new dryers. We don't WANT to buy a new dryer. We want to buy a new stove!
Rob called Whirlpool, the maker of our dryer. We called to find out the capacity of our dryer, cause I don't want to downsize, and they told us the stats. They also informed us that our dryer is 26 years old. I'M 28! The dryer could be my younger sibling.
This made me think a few things:
1 - I remembered that last winter our furnace almost died. I forget exactly what happened. Maybe it wouldn't light? Whatever happened, it's likely to happen again this year, without a miraculous recovery, and there goes 2 thou.
2 - The previous owners of our home had some mystical power over machinery. It seems like every major appliance is 20+ years old. That's incredible (though inevitably not so good for our pocketbook)!
3 - Forget about buying a new stove.
4 - If this had happened on Monday, we would have had the cash IN HAND to buy a new dryer. But since it happened 3 DAYS LATER, we have new tires instead. Not that I'm sad about the new tires--it was a great purchase. It just wasn't pressing. We could have put it off for a few months, at least.
and 5 - We have an Emergency Fund for these sorts of things.
I kept thinking about it. Does this REALLY count as an Emergency? 50 years ago people didn't HAVE dryers. (75 years ago?) They just let their clothes dry on a line. A line. Huh. We did a clothes line 2 summers ago. I liked it. Could we do an indoor clothes line for the winter?
I looked on-line. There are many, many options for indoor clothes drying. I started talking to Rob about my "green" idea. My main question was, in humid Ohio, would it work to dry our clothes in the basement? Rob resisted the idea altogether. And then, after prodding him for a while, he said, "That's how we did it in Germany." Well, then. That means it'll work.
So here's for buying a drying rack (actually, we'll be buying 2) until we have enough money to buy that dryer without having to access our Emergency Fund. Or maybe until ever, if I like it. Drying my clothes on a drying rack isn't the end of the world. I mean, some people actually LIKE it. Imagine.
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