Keeping Me Sane

If I had to name one household appliance that I could not live without, it would probably be my vacuum cleaner (coffee maker would come in close second). With the exception of our bathroom and kitchen, our apartment has wall-to-wall carpeting. Oh, and did I mention that we have a dining room? That has carpet too. We eat in the dining room. So, I pretty much don't need to explain why I could not live without my vacuum cleaner.

We use our vacuum probably every other day. Though, after Lily arrived it has been harder to vacuum as often as we would like. The carpet looked pretty desperate last Monday, so I went right to it. The only problem was that it wasn't sucking up anything. I kept going over the mess, but specks were just being tossed around. I looked underneath the machine and saw no obvious signs of blockage. I decided to give up and call it a day.

On Tuesday the carpet was only getting worse, so I decided to get to the bottom of our problem. This time I took the vacuum apart. I quickly discovered what the problem was.

Who knows how long most of that junk was stuck in there! I was so excited by my discovery and quickly put the vacuum back together to get going on our messy carpet. I turned the cleaner on and, to my dismay, the green light indicating that the machine was working properly was not on. It turns out you have to put the vacuum cleaner together "just so" for it to work (I remember my mom and I having this problem before). I tried and tried again. Then I gave up and called it a day.

Yikes, three days have passed. I must vacuum this carpet! Vacuuming has turned out to be quite therapeutic for me. I love getting a fresh start during the week with a newly vacuumed carpet. I decided to search the internet for clues. I found instructions on replacing the vacuums belt. That, paired with using my brain, led to an actual successful result. I was elated!

I started with the girls' room. This vacuum cleaner was like new again! I was going to town. Then, all of a sudden, I noticed a bouncing spool of thread. The vacuum managed to grab at the loose end of the thread and was unwinding the spool (and simultaneously winding the thread around the brush of the vacuum). By the time I shut the machine off the thread was gone. Thankfully I was able to resolve this problem pretty easily. Phew!

Another great thing about our vacuum is that, while it gets the older girls wired up (they run around and give their girly-est screams), it instantly calms a fussy Lily. I'm glad I have it back in working order.