The Ceiling Fan Story

Have I got a story to tell this morning? Yeppers! :) I'm not usually sneaky, but yesterday I surprised Jeff with ceiling fans. We've been wanting to put up ceiling fans/light fixtures in our living room and office for quite some time, but it's kinda a big DIY project for us because there weren't even existing light fixtures in those places, so we've been putting it off. On Wednesday, I saw that the fans I really, really liked were a super awesome price at Costco. I called an electrician to come install them for us because I felt better about an experienced professional to do the wiring in the attic. He came yesterday and one of the fans is installed, but it wasn't an easy job and I'm glad I paid someone else to do it!

Before installing the fans, he put in extra light switches to control the ceiling fan in the living room, just like I had asked him to. Then he installed the fan, which BTW, has a receiver that had to be in place at the beginning of the fan installation process so we can use the remote that came with the fan. He had to take the fan down to put in the receiver and in the process, he dropped the fan and it broke. Oops! He said that was the first time in ten years that had happened. I'm just glad it happened to him and not my Jeffrey! Anyway, he set the broken fan aside and installed the second fan in it's place, with the receiver in this time. He will come back to install a fan in the office after I purchase another one. Anyway, funny thing is, the light switch (that I paid extra for) cannot turn on the ceiling fan/light because of the remote feature. The switch can turn the fan/light off, but if we want it back on after we've turned off the switch, we've got to make sure the switch is turned on and then use the remote. How lame is that? What if we lose the remote? Then we have a non-functioning ceiling fan/light in our living room.

When the electrician comes back to install the other fan, I'm going to ask him to not put the receiver in. As for the first fan...I don't want to have to pay the guy to take it down again and remove the receiver, so we're going to attempt it ourselves. I think we can do it. I've already read the installation instructions and I'm going to watch how the electrician does the wiring on the next fan.

Well, Jeff liked the surprise! He said he was glad I had it done because he didn't know when he would have gotten around to it. He can hardly wait now for the day when he can walk into the office and just flip on a light with the switch! :)