Baby-proofing - and more

What a crazy week. How crazy was it? Well, there's no picture for this post, so that might give you an idea. As an aside, we (and by we, I primarily mean I) are (unless you take it that we means I, then am) still looking for a new camera. As a reminder, this will be our Christmas gift to each other. Hopefully we'll get one before Christmas 2007. There are lot of new cameras coming out this spring, so hopefully one will look good and Best Buy will actually carry it.

Back to discussing the week...

Sunday
We returned home on Super Bowl Sunday after having spent the weekend up in GB and Fenton. The main reason we headed up was to spend some time on GnGT's frozen pond. Pete and my Dad helped us clear a section of ice, and then Dan and I skated while the women watched from the comforts of the condo. Alison and Colin also had fun playing on the ice as MPnA and DLCnM also came over.

When we got home, our house was not nearly as comfy as GnGT's condo. At some point, over the weekend, our furnace stopped working and our house was a not-so-toasty 54 degrees.

We immediately tried calling people to take a look at the furnace, but between the insane cold (Global Warming?) and the big game, we were only able to get a friend of a neighbor to come take a look. He determined that the electronic gas valve was not opening. Unfortunately, he would not be able to get the part until the following day.

Michele took Jake back up to GnGT while I headed over to the Pruss house to watch the game and then camp out.

Monday
On Monday, Michele took Jacob over to MPnA while she went to a conference in Lansing. Alison's school was canceled, so she got to spend the whole day with Jake and Meme.

Down in Livonia, where the house dipped to 41 degrees overnight, we were able to get the gas valve installed and the furnace fired up... for about 5 minutes. Once the furnace began to run, the service tech noticed that there was some "flame back" that caused one of four temperature sensors to trip thus turning off the furnace. He then determined that the furnace had a cracked heat exchanger. While this does not allow for proper heating, it also posed a risk for elevated carbon monoxide levels.

After a few phone calls we found out that it would be less cost-effective to have the exchanger replaced than to replace the whole thing. We got a quote and hired out the job to a local heating place.

We were able to bypass the heat sensors that allowed us to keep the furnace running and get the house back up to a livable level, and we were able to sleep at our own house.

Tuesday
With Michele at school and Jake at day care, I was able to work from home while we waited on the crew to pick up and install our furnace. By the end of the day, the house had only dipped to 61 degrees, and they had our new furnace "temped" in. It was able to heat the house, but things like the cold air exchange among other odds and ends were not finished.

Wednesday
The crew came back fairly early in the morning to finish their work. Right around noon, they had completely installed our new Lennox furnace including an upgraded air filter and a humidifier. We are hoping that these two upgrades might help with Jake's respiratory issues. They should also help when we go to sell the house.

Wednesday was also my Dad's birthday. Happy Birthday!

Thursday/Friday
Nothing too much out of the ordinary happened on these two days, which was a nice way to end the work week. And, we had heat, so that's good.

Saturday
In the early evening, we packed up and headed to Rochester for Maiya's baptism. The service was held at St Mary's of the Hills in Rochester. After the 5:00 Mass, five children, including Maiya, were baptized by the Deacon. The service was very nice, which was bad for me (explained in a bit). Maiya ended up sleeping through a lot of the ceremony, but woke up as she had the water poured over her head. You can find some photos of the event here.

Immediately after the baptism, I headed downtown for the annual UM/MSU hockey game at the Joe. Since I was asked to be the Godfather (and Michele the Godmother), I couldn't miss out on the Baptism and had to meet up with the gang afterwards. I got there with about 5 minutes left in the first period, and MSU was already up 2-0. After extending the lead to 3-0, Michigan slowly chipped away and tied the game up with a few minutes left. The game ended in a 3-3 tie after an overtime dominated by Michigan, but shutdown by the MSU goalie.

Sunday
After a busy day of baby-proofing much of the house, including the all-important gate to block the stairs, MPnA and Great Grandma Stewart stopped by. After a quick visit, we all met Mark and Kelly at Champps for a birthday dinner for Dad. Hopefully there will be another post in the next few days with the photos that were taken at the restaurant.