Happening Around Here

Clean smoke detectors compressed air

Since we last mentioned our late night wake up call, we've unfortunately been dealing with more problems with our smoke detectors. 

Last week there was one sleepless night where the alarms went off five (ish - I stopped counting) times between midnight and 3:30.  Needless to say, no one was happy (or sleeping).

We started brainstorming ideas of what could be happening - humidifier? Except it was shut off.. Maybe the detectors were defective and needed to be replaced?  It seemed to be two specific ones that kept going off.  Or maybe they were dirty?  Apparently you're supposed to clean your smoke detectors monthly with compressed air - who knew!?

So as we were brainstorming, we relaxed a bit and had a few nights of uninterrupted sleep.  And then on Saturday, I had a friend visiting and the alarms went off.  In the middle of the day.  Of course Tom wasn't there, and I quickly realized that I can't reach the reset buttons, so it took a while, but I eventually got them hushed.  I opened all the windows, and turned on fans just as a precaution so it wouldn't happen again.

Of course it did. Another 3 times before Tom got home.  So I sent him out to get some replacements and some compressed air... and 30 seconds after he pulled out of the driveway, they went off again! It was a long day, but at least we weren't sleeping!  As of now we've cleaned all the detectors (they were a bit dirty!) and we're ready with new ones to replace any that go off again.  Fingers crossed we've got this problem solved, but in the meantime I think I have alarm PTSD.  I keep waking up in the middle of the night freaking out that they might go off soon.  Bleh. 

Maybe because of the lack of sleep around here, Maia and I took some time to sleep in a bit on Saturday morning and enjoy some time in bed.  Miss kitty here is turning 9 years old in less than a week!  I have no idea how that happened so quickly, but I couldn't ask for a better furry friend to have in my life for the past almost decade.  

She's also been helping us get ready for her new, soon to be, best friend.  We can't put baby Spearson in the crib or on the changing table until it has been thoroughly tested, now can we? So far she's been unwilling to test out the car seat, but in the meanwhile we took some time to unpackage it, and making sure everything was working as it should be.   

The pace of things around here has definitely slowed down. Not much gets done during the weeks, and the weekends are for resting and breathing and catching up on daily life.  Sometimes going to church is about all I can manage in a day, and projects and other things on the to-do list have to be put aside until another weekend.  But that's okay... life is going to change a lot soon, and we might as well get used to it now.