A tale of two ovens

My kitchen at my old house really was lovely.  After years of living with a small kitchen just larger than that in our first apartment, we decided to redo and enlarge it by tearing down some awkward columns and taking in one of the three living spaces in our 2000 square foot house.  The results were wonderful and served our family and guests quite well.  One of the things I loved the most was my large set of Frigidaire double convection ovens.

Those are my beloved ovens in the background behind my beloved daughter, an avid baker, around Christmas time a few years ago.

As much as I loved those ovens, I knew I needed a comparable replacement for the kitchen at the new house.  The oven left behind by Previous Owner had been grossly neglected by Previous Tenant.  It was a cheap gas range that was dirty, unlevel, heated unevenly and all around stunk.

I considered getting the newer model of my old Frigidaires, but they changed several features and added a "Chicken Nugget" button.  To me, that was a stupid enough addition to keep me from buying from them.  I researched and researched and finally decided on a beautiful, double-convection, classically styled Kenmore Pro.  To my delight, I found a floor model on the Sears Outlet website for half the cost of a new one.  I selected the coordinating 5-burner gas cooktop, added both to my online shopping cart, made my purchase, including the extended warranties, and waited for them to be shipped.

My cooktop arrived a short 10 days after the placing of my order, as promised.  I ordered these way back at the end of December, knowing full well that the kitchen renovation was still months away, so I was in no hurry.  But then several more days went by and my ovens had yet to arrive.  Then several more days.  And then a couple of weeks.  I began placing calls to Customer Service.  The service reps were absolutely wonderful--so polite, well-spoken and appearing genuinely concerned about the delay in my order.  I can't speak highly enough of them.  But I still didn't have my ovens.  Long story short, after several calls that I had to place (Sears never called me to explain the delay) as well as broken glass on the original oven that was set to be shipped to me, I received three more large discounts off of the already discounted price I originally paid and had a brand new, straight from the factory, non-floor model that finally did arrive--about 3 months later than originally promised.

The ovens then sat in my carport waiting for the day they could finally get moved in.  They are, however, quite huge, and my house sits a good 4 feet off the ground and has no ramp.  My husband suggested that he and I could handle moving them in.  While I appreciate his confidence in my strength, I knew this was a bad plan.  We called a local kid who has done some work at the Rectangle for my father-in-law, but he was busy.  Thankfully, his older (and much larger) brother was available. Randy came over and, with seemingly relative ease, helped my husband hoist the beast up the back steps and into the kitchen where it awaited final installation.  I think I may have held my breath the entire time the ovens were in motion, but they made it to their next resting spot unscathed.