My Own Holiday Dilemna and Life's Journey...

We had our Thanksgiving with family the weekend before. My daughter and her family got to come up from Corpus Christi and I was so thrilled. We all gathered at my son and his girlfriend's home over in Waxahachie (Indian names) LOL ... it is our county seat about 15 miles away... Jim and I took Mom with us ... so it was the entire family ... I got to finally see my 3 Grand Kids ... the two youngest ones, Logan is 3 and James is 5, going to be 6 in December, then her step daughter who they have raised since she was 2, Heather who is now 15! That seems impossible. My daughter started dating her husband when his daughter was only 2. Now here they are with the two boys, Heather is a teenager, and it all seems like just yesterday. I had said in my blog, that I was kind of sad that Saturday. The two smaller ones, especially Logan really don't know me very well. Since they are so far away, they almost "forget" who Nana is. We only see them 2 or 3 times a year, so it is such a huge deal when we do get to visit. Then Thanksgiving Day, ours was very simple also. After that weekend of my daughter's awesome cooking, we were ready for something not so filling. So we cut up some fresh veggies, and fruit ... got some of that low-calorie cheese spread with crackers, and I made some Rice Krispie treats. We visited my Mom for a couple of hours early afternoon, then came home to watch the Cowboys get their butts stomped, and enjoyed the "finger foods". So, ours was fairly laid back and quiet also. Thank Goodness my oven is fixed!!! Over a week ago, I was baking a cake, and our smoke alarm went off. I ran to the kitchen and we at first could not tell anything was wrong. We do have a new smoke alarm and the damned thing is extremely sensitive, so I figured something had dropped on the foil I keep in their and I had not seen it. It kept trying to go off and suddenly I noticed the very top of my cake looking like it was "broiling", yet it still had like 12 minutes or more to go!!! Well it dawned on me, the oven was staying on fully, and with that temperature like that it was as if the cake were in the broiler. So we turned it off.  I took the cake out, then decided heck it was almost done, and was not burned exactly, so I put it back in the oven and it finished baking LOL!!!!! It was already far enough it had risen, but just needed to cook a little more in the center. Anyway, the freaking thermostat we figured must have gone out!!! Right here at Thanksgiving, of course for us, "Murphy's Law", and we had no idea about getting one. So, we got the model number etc off of the oven, and I did a Google search, and found the manual, and the actual part number. At first the only one I found was over a 100.00! I almost fainted ... but then my favorite shopping place, Amazon, had it for 55.00! But, it was of course too late for the holiday, but it worked out my daughter did most of the cooking, and I took stuff I did not need to put in the oven, so we decided to not even cook a huge meal for us, and just do the veggies etc. Then later Thanksgiving afternoon, here comes our next door neighbor's daughter with 2 huge plates of Thanksgiving Dinner after all!!! They had sent turkey, dressing, potatoes, even a piece of pecan pie after all!!! I was already "turkeyed" out ... but Jim enjoyed all of it the next day. :) Anyway, the oven part came yesterday!:) So, Jim found what he thought was the way to put the thermostat in ... which what he found sounded stupid and way to difficult I thought. They had us almost pulling  the burners out etc ... and it just did not sound right. I told him I thought we should be going in through the back, and he almost got pissed at me... LOL!, but I got online and found other instructions that did say part of the thing WAS pulling the BACK off so you could access the thermostat from there, then running the new one through from the front panel that comes off, and to the back, and down through the hole where it goes in the oven. Viola!!! Between the instructions and a little "horse sense" we did get it and I prayed when we turned it on, sure enough; it worked!!! So far so good!  It came on like it should and then turned off when the oven got to the correct temp! LOL! I was shouting THANK YOU GOD!!! All of that, and I was so hoping we had found the issue, the right part, and had put it in correctly...:) I just hope it continues to work... OR a new STOVE will be here dammit. It was a nightmare getting that darned thing in, between his back being so messed up and all of my issues, I thought we both would be in the bed for days after that, well I can't sleep of course, what is new ... and I know his back is once again more painful than usual ... but you know all too well how that goes ... we just have to DIY, do it ourselves, if possible. We would have gone broke having someone come in and repair it ... thus you do what you have to do. Anyway, that has been our "thorn in the side" this past 2 weeks ... along of course with the other crap that goes on with houses, cars, etc.... LOL! Okay I have talked "typed" enough!