cooking when compacting

Well our family continues to compact. We have fallen off the wagon a couple of times and heeded the call of the golden arches, but mostly we've done great. Last night however, we started a new chapter in compacting. How long can we go without an oven? After we put dinner on the table, our oven started beeping at us and flashing the message F-2 on the display . By hitting the oven cancel button, the stove would stop beeping for about 30 seconds and then it would start to beep again. We decided to google our oven (it's a Roper Nouvelle) and see what we could find. What we found out was that our heat sensor was gone. It was going to cost between $80-$160 plus S&H to replace the part. Our oven is really old- maybe 25 or more and we were trying to decide whether or not to fix it. While we both want a new oven, our current one vents underneath- a way that is no longer done on ovens, which means buying a self venting hood or microwave to go with it. This would be very expensive. We decided that we were going to buy a new oven if the part we needed was the $160 part and that we would pay for part of it with reward point gift cards from one of our credit cards. This meant waiting a month or so for the points. So, i have a month of menus using just the stove top (which still works), the crock pot, and the grilled. Then Shawn called, it's the cheapr part and it will be here later this week. Still, I have the next's week menu done all w/o an oven- and I'm sharing it because i can. Tuesday-pasta, Wednesday Tacos, Thursday roast pork (in the crock pot), Friday a huge sub sandwich, Saturday BBQ pork sandwiches (in the crock pot w/ the leftovers), Sunday Shawn's chicken noodle soup and next Monday Breakfast for dinner. So, happy eating every one- and no trips to the golden arches for this ovenless compacting family. :)