Customer service is still alive!

Yesterday, I decided to take my engagement ring and wedding band and have them resized because they just don't fit me at this point. *sigh* While I had been at the mall last week, I'd seen a jewelry repair store that said they could resize my ring while I shopped. "Great!" I thought. So, I took my rings in yesterday, and said that I would pick them up in a few hours after I took the girls home to nap.

At about 1PM, I received a phone call from the store. It was the jeweler, calling to say, "Your center stone on your engagement ring isn't a real diamond."

"Excuse me?"

"Well, when I heated the ring up to make the cut to add in more platinum, the stone turned white, which is a good indication that the stone is a cz - cubic zirconia. We don't have a diamond tester in the store, so I wasn't able to test it before I started the work. I'm going to go ahead and finish it, but I wanted to let you know." He also told me that they could replace the cz, at my cost.

"OK, I'll be in in a bit to pick it up." At this point, I was so baffled, confused, and above all, crushed, that that was all I could think to say. What I really should have done was told him to discontinue the work, and that I would come pick it up to be evaluated. But like I said, I wasn't thinking clearly at that point.

Once the initial shock wore off, I called Jim to let him know what I'd been told, and also to find out what he'd been told when he purchased it. I had to leave a message because he's away on training, and wasn't able to get to the phone. In the meantime, I decided to call Kay Jewelers, where the ring had been purchased from after I'd searched the internet, both their site, and Google, to see if I could find any info on my ring. The paperwork for it is MIA, most likely in storage at the moment.

After being stuck in the cue for a while, I finally spoke to Lori. I explained what had happened, that I had taken it to be resized, and they called and told me that the stone was a cz, and not a diamond. She immediately said that wasn't possible, that Kay's doesn't even carry cz, and that if they had a customer come in with a piece of jewelry containing cz, they wouldn't do work on it because they wouldn't be able to replace the cz if something were to happen to it.

Lori went on to explain to me that I could have just brought it in the Kay's for a free resizing (foolish mistake on my part, but I really wanted to wear my rings as soon as possible, and also didn't realize it would have been a free service). She looked up the info about Jim having purchased the ring to verify that it was their ring, and also explained about how this would void their warranty on the ring since I'd gone to someone else for a repair (another stupid mistake on my part).

I began asking her a few questions, and she politely put me on hold for a few minutes, and when she came back, she told me that she'd been looking through her books trying to come up with a reason as to why the stone in my ring would have turned white since diamonds shouldn't do that at all. She also cautioned me about paying and leaving the store with the ring because then I would run the risk of not being able to get them to repair the ring.

She then asked where I was to figure out the closest Kay Jeweler to see if I could go there and have them diamond test the stone. When I told her what mall I was going to, she verified that it had a store, and offered to call them for me to let them know that I would be coming in with the ring for diamond testing. I thanked her for all of her help, and hung up.

I got the girls up from nap, loaded them into the car, and began driving over to the mall. In between talking to Lori and getting into the car, I had also talked to Jim and explained everything to him, where I had gone for the resizing and whatnot. While I was driving to the mall, Jim called me again to let me know that I should see the owner of the store, and that either he would copy my drivers license or accompany me to Kay's for a diamond test before I paid for the ring.

I got to the mall, went into the store, and spoke to both the owner and the jeweler. They showed me the ring, and I asked the jeweler why the repair had even been done if he wasn't able to test the stone before hand (something that I'd thought about after speaking to Lori, who said that anytime they get a stone in, they test it before work is done). The jeweler immediately became defensive and said that he assumed that it was real because it was set in platinum, which requires a great deal of heat to be applied to work with. In my head, I thought, "Well, you've just assumed liability right there since you didn't test it and told me that you assumed it to be real."

I retorted with, "No one asked me what the stone was. It could have been anything." to which the owner responded, "What would you have told me it was?" I said that I would have said a diamond, because that's what I was told it was, but the point was, no one asked me about the stone, and then it wasn't tested.

The color of the stone was a milky white, and sort of reminded me of a Cape May Diamond. For those of you not familiar, a Cape May Diamond is actually a piece of quartz from the Atlantic Ocean that travels down the coast. One can find them on the beaches of Cape May, NJ. I'm sure you can find them elsewhere, but I can remember visiting Cape May when I was younger and finding them. The stone, before it's polished and cut to look like a diamond (hence the name), is a milky, frosty white colored stone.

I told them that I wanted to have it tested, and also made it known that I knew that the owner had spoken with Jim about doing as such. So, both the owner and jeweler decided to accompany me down to Kay's, which was actually right below the store that I had gone to.

We went into the store, and I told them who I was, and Chelsea said that she'd spoken to Lori on the phone. She took the ring from me, and put it under a microscope. Her first question was, "Why is the setting lose?" I think she was thinking what I'd been thinking, but hoping beyond all hope that it wasn't true, that the stone may have been switched and they were trying to dupe me. She then pulled out the testing wand, and said, "It's a diamond." She showed the jeweler, who was on the defense, saying he'd never seen anything like this, and he'd done nothing wrong. They then asked if there were any other stores that might have a tester (which I thought was weird because really, shouldn't any jeweler have one, or not do any repairs to jewelry if they can't test it?), and we ended up going to Zales, which was right next door to the repair shop's storefront. Again, it tested as a diamond.

The two men walked ahead of me and spoke in low tones, and I was thinking to myself, "If you try anything, I will slap a lawsuit on you so fast..." but I was able to squelch this thought pretty quickly because once in the store, the jeweler said that they would replace the stone. He also said that they wouldn't charge me for the resizing, after the owner double checked this with the jeweler. What I was thinking, as was Jim, who's running the show here? The owner or the jeweler?

But anyway, the good news was, I only had to pay for one ring, the other ring is going to be sent out to have the stone replaced, and I at least have my wedding band to wear now (which both rings were resized properly).

After all of this, I had another errand to run in the mall, and on my way back, I decided to stop by Kay's to let them know what was going to happen, because for one thing, while we were in there, Chelsea kept saying that if the ring had been in their possession, they would be replacing the stone. While I was there, I asked her if she could pull up the information about what type of diamond (clarity/color/carat/cut) had been in my ring. The owner of the other store had asked, but I wasn't able to provide him that information off the top of my head.

Chelsea was extremely helpful, and also very compassionate. She told me she was glad that I'd stopped by because she'd been on the phone with Lori, and both of them wanted to know what had happened in the end. I told her that I'd contact Lori and update her, thanked her for all of her help, and left the store. When I called Lori once I was home, she was happy to hear that it had been resolved as well.

I've decided that both of these women went out of their way to help me, and for that I will be eternally grateful. I have a call in to Kay's corporate office so that I can put in commendations for both of these women. I wanted to speak with a supervisor, and none were available when I called earlier today, so I'm hoping that someone calls me back either today or on Monday.

Customer service is still alive!

Under Contract!!!

After a bit of negotiation, we have officially gone under contract for our house.  We are now waiting for the inspection, which has been scheduled in a couple days, and also for their FHA appraisal.

We were a bit leery to accept the offer in the beginning because of some of the stories that we'd heard concerning FHA appraisers, who can be very nit-picky at times.  If you're not familiar, FHA is federal insurance on a mortgage.  FHA looks out for themselves by making sure that the house appraises for the price that the buyer has agreed to pay, and as I said, can be super nit-picky.  The biggest issue is that FHA requires that anything they say needs to be done (like paint chipping on the exterior or interior) has to be completed before settlement for them to go through with the loan, unlike with a conventional mortgage, where items can be negotiated, and money can be given at the settlement table for items to be completed.  We can still negotiate the items with the buyer as to who pays for what, but in the end, it still must be completed before settlement

In the end, we decided to accept the offer because if FHA comes back with a long list of items, we can either say, we'll pay for a couple, and they can pay for some, or there's too much that FHA says needs to be done, and the deal can be done.  We're hoping that there won't be much, if anything that needs to be done.  So now we must wait for inspection to be done, and for the appraisal to be set up.  We are supposed to have the completed mortgage package by next Friday, which would be awesome because then we'd be able to put in an offer on a house.  Until we're in the "waiting for settlement" stage, we're stuck "looking but not touching" houses on the market.  

We're even more anxious now, because a house just went on the market, and we went to see it yesterday.  Both my husband and I got that "I'm home" feeling from it.  It had a gorgeous property, a nice big driveway, a big garage, and plenty of space for us to live in!  The best part is, it's a vacant property, and if all goes well with inspections, we'll be going to settlement on our house in the beginning of September, so we could potentially get a settlement date right around ours to move into this house!  So fingers crossed that everything works out for us :-)

The decision to move

I mentioned in my first post about having our house up for sale.  We made the decision to move from our current home for several reasons.  

One reason is that we would like to move out of the town in which my husband works.  He is a police officer, and we currently live in town.  We'd like to move out of town to help remove some of the potential awkwardness of dad being an embarrassment at school at some point, or the potential for him to have a run-in with either a friend of the girls, or *GASP* one of the girls themselves!  That would not be much fun at all.

Another reason is that we're considering the possibility of expanding our family, and we'll need more space than we currently have.  We are currently in a 3 bedroom house, and are still considering 3 bedroom houses (although 4 would be more ideal), with the possibility of putting an edition on to the house at some point to create another bedroom.  We'd thought of doing that to our current house, but we've decided that it would be best to move out of the town that we currently reside in.

Nursemaid's Elbow

I have 2 children, both girls, both under the age of 4.  They are a lot of fun, and are definitely bundles of energy.  They're also very independent and free-spirited, so getting them to cooperate is an accomplishment to say the least hehe!  

So how does this relate to nursemaid's elbow you may ask?  Or, you might be scratching your head at nursemaid's elbow in general.  I'll first explain what nursemaid's elbow is, and then I will explain how it relates to my spirited children.

Nursemaid's elbow is a common ailment that young children, especially those between the ages of 1-4, suffer from.  Not only is the age range key here, but for some reason, girls seem to suffer from it more often then boys, and it tends to be the left arm most of the time (due to many right-handed parents holding their child's left hand).  It's usually caused from an over-extention of the arm, and causes the elbow to dislocate due to weak and underdeveloped ligaments in the elbow.  It's painful at the time, but relatively easy to fix -so easy that I have now been shown how to fix it at home instead of traipsing to the doctors office if it happens again - but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Now that you know a little bit about nursemaid's elbow, I'll explain how it relates to my energetic children, or in this case, my energetic 17 month old.  Last week, I had dropped my 3 year old off at day camp, and went to Target to get a few items.  When we got there, I decided since I was only getting a couple small things, that instead of wrestling my young daughter into a cart, and having her scream in protest for being held captive and forced to sit, that I would allow her to walk around.

We had been walking, and I was allowing her free reign, as it was early on a Monday morning, so there weren't that many other patrons in the store.  Unfortunately, my free-spirited 17 month old decided to take full advantage of her free reign, and began running away from me every chance that she got.  

I was able to regain control of the situation though, and managed to convince her to hold my hand, of which I used my right hand (can you see where this is going?), and we began making our way towards the check-out.  Right before we made it to one of the open check out lanes (which were of course on the opposite end of the store), she tripped, and I was unable to let go of her hand in time.  I felt a small click,  and she let out a small cry, but after less than a minute, got up, and began trekking on as if nothing happened.  We got into line, and the cashier began ringing up my items, when I noticed that my little 17 month old was holding her left arm close to her body, and propping it up with her right hand.  I knew something wasn't right.  I quickly finished my transaction, scooped her up, practically flew to the car, put her in, and began dialing my husband.  

My husband is a police officer, so I sort of wanted his opinion as he has a little bit more first aid training than I do.  He told me to call the pediatrician (which had been my first inclination) and then to call him back.  So I did where they advised me to take her to the ER.  I called him back, and in the meantime, he had called the chief of the ambulance company, who asked me to stop by so he could have a look.  After we'd met up with him, he couldn't ascertain if the injury was to her elbow or shoulder (we'd ruled out wrist, which had been my initial thought).  So we drove to the emergency room to have her looked at.  My husband left work so that he could go pick up our other daughter from camp, and then waited to hear from me.

If you have to go to the emergency room, I highly recommend trying to go mid-morning on a weekday.  I was in and out of there in 2 hours, which is something!  (I know, you're thinking, "it's the EMERGENCY ROOM, you don't plan your trip there!", but I'm just saying!).  Anyway, I checked in, and was called back within 5 minutes.  They assessed her, took her vitals, and then took us back to a room.  A nurse and physicians assistant came in almost instantly, Children's Motrin was administered, and the PA took a look at her arm, then rotated it, said, "I felt it click", and then it was over.  

I was then instructed to hop on the bed with her, and we were wheeled for an xray, both to make sure that it had been set back, and to make sure that there wasn't any fractures or anything.  I sat with her during the xray, holding her arm in the correct position for the technician, then we were wheeled back to the ER room.  They left us in for a bit, and during that time, she began using her arm again, playing with the toys that I'd brought, or the toys that they had in the room.  After about an hour, they came in, were pleased that she was using her arm, said the xrays look good, and would be back with discharge papers/instructions and we would be able to go home.

Fast forward 1 week and 1 day.  The hubby had the girls out with him at the shoe store.  He was looking for a new pair of running shoes.  He said that the girls were being cute, holding hands and walking around.  But they started getting a bit silly, and began running down the isle, and turned the corner, out of his sight.  He began following, and as he came to the end, saw our little one down on the ground.  He left the store immediately, came home, and said, "She did it again".  I held her wrist and turned her arm a bit to see if I could establish where the pain was coming from.

I called the doctor's office and told them what happened and asked that either she been seen in the office or if I could be walked through how to put her arm back in place over the phone.  I have a friend who's daughter has popped her elbow a few times, and was walked through it over the phone.  They gave me an appointment for a couple of hours later.  In the meantime, our wild woman of a 17 month old began to slowly use her arm again, first just to pick up her sippy cup with both hands, then she began rolling around on the ground, grabbing her feet above her head, and sealed the deal my rolling on to her belly, and pushing herself up to a standing position using both arms.  We decided to take her in anyway, just to make sure that everything looked/felt ok.

I took her over to the doctor's, and they said that she looked good, and that I must have inadvertently popped her arm back in.  Then, they showed me how to maneuver her arm in case it would happen again, saving me both a trip to the office and a copay.

A new chapter in my journey

There's a lot going on in my life at the moment.  I have an awesome husband who works quite a bit, but enables me to be a stay-at-home-mom.  Therefore, I spend a lot of time alone with our two children both under the age of 4, whom keep me super busy.  I stay at home with them, so we rush off to various activities; school, play groups, and daily errands.  We have two cats (which are "vacationing" at my mom's until further notice), and a super sweet 2 year old boxer/shepherd/rottweiler mix.

We're also trying to sell our house, so there is a constant shuffle of clean, collect children and dog, fight with dog to get him in the car, drive over to my mom's house.  There we get to see the kitties, who are "vacationing" as I've said until we sell our house and move into a new house (which we also don't have).

I've also decided that I'm done struggling with my weight.  I'm still stuck with baby weight from both girls, and have been trying off and on to get rid of it through several failed attempts and diet and exercise.  But, I'm fed up.  I've never been super skinny, but I wasn't really overweight until I hit college, which began a downward spiral of too much junk food, not enough exercise, too much drinking, and not enough exercise.

I'm trying to make some easy to live with, but good for me changes, such as drinking more water, eating better, and at some point I'll figure out some exercise that I actually enjoy.