Wednesday, March 2, 2011

My Dishwasher Broke Down!



My dishwasher broke down... in early December. NOT the best time what with all of the extra cooking, baking and entertaining that accompanies the festive month. My husband took it apart and tried to fix the noisy beast. He found some olive pits, a toothpick and some pieces of broken glass stuck in the soft food disposer part. He thought he had solved the mystery of the loud grinding sound that rang through the entire
house each time we turned it on.

Turns out, he was wrong. So, he called an appliance parts store only to discover that the new part he needed cost nearly as much as a new dishwasher itself. Can you imagine? Things got busy for him and so he put off either trying to secure a part and fix it himself or actually buying a new dishwasher.


These are my observations about the whole thing:

* The plates/glasses/bowls that I am in need of are
  always at the ready because they are always clean.
*We have added drying breakfast and lunch dishes to Athena's repertoire of jobs to do and she quite likes it.
  One time she asked if she could "wet" the dishes instead of always drying.
* Great conversations are to be had standing at the kitchen sink doing dishes in the evening.
*We always have cutting boards, knives, wood bowls and wine glasses to wash every night anyway so
  the sink was already being filled.
* I do not miss the sound of the dishwasher running.
*It takes much less time to wash, dry and put away the dishes than it does for a load full to run through.
*One of my worst things was going to load the dishwasher after supper only to discover that I had not
  unloaded the dishwasher from the last run through, so this has eliminated that frustration.

So we are three months dishwasher free and I must say, I love it. I am thinking maybe put one of those built in wine racks in its place but then I think, will the boxes of wine we buy fit in the slots???

4 comments:

Tara said...

Wow... I've been waiting three years for a dishwasher and there is no reason to believe I will have one anytime soon. I just feel like the counters and sink stay cleaner when you have a dishwasher.

Enjoy the hand washing and get some yummy smelling dish liquid - i love lavender!!

Anonymous said...

It is so much faster to wash the dishes by hand, and you're right about conversation. I remember me, Jen and Jill, or as you may have known them 'Wash, Dry," and "Put Away", doing dishes together every night- standing on chairs to reach to sink, but being together. Dishwashers, no matter how silent they claim to be, are still loud, and never clean as well as a hand clean!

Nicole said...

Also, washing dishes by hand uses a lot less water!

dawn klinge said...

I went for a couple of years without a dishwasher, and I really didn't mind at all. I loved your comment about the boxes of wine fitting in the wine rack. ;)