Baby, it's cold inside!

Despite my optimism that I could fix my furnace by simply changing the filter, it turns out that it was just a coincidence that the furnace started working again, and really it was just coughing out its last feeble breaths before it died.
We woke Saturday morning to a cool house, but we had an early morning appointment with the dentist, to discuss the best method of capping Tritan's teeth (see below ), and had appointments and commitments the rest of the day. It was a cold day and when we finally traipsed back home, the temperature inside hovered above 60*. So we lit a fire in our fireplace, and turned on the electric baseboard heaters in the addition. We pulled out the sleeping bags and let the kids sleep all together in the addition, and dug out the space heater for our room upstairs. It all felt very cozy, sitting together in front of the fire, the kids camping out in the extra room.
But in the morning, the temperature outside was 18* and the temperature inside was 55* and Brian was afraid the pipes would freeze, so we called our home warranty and had them send a guy to fix the furnace even though it was Sunday. When the kids and I got home from church, the house was a nice and toasty 69*.
Sunday morning-- the kids huddled around the breakfast table in blankets and coats, eating warm wheat cereal and hot chocolate-- Tritan said: "Boy, we sure are having a hardship, aren't we?"
I had to chuckle a little before I replied, " No, no this is not a hardship. We have a fireplace. We have that extra room with the heaters. We have hot water. And we have a home warranty so it will only cost us $50 to fix the furnace. No, this isn't a hardship. Besides, don't you think it's kind of fun?"
I was grateful that we were prepared with logs for the fireplace and a home warranty, so we could get it fixed without worrying about the cost. We're not prepared for every emergency, but it does make a difference in whether something is a hardship, or just a little excitement in our weekend.