ENums and Properties in Custom Controls

I am a former vb/vb.net programmer, new to the entire C (C,C++,C#) thing. I have created a series of custom controls for our software, ther are graphical representations of machines that our software manages. My problem is that I have Custom properties on the controls that are of the custom enumerated type. ex. Here is the Variable public csMeterStyle.grfxAlarms mtrAlarm = csMeterStyle.grfxAlarms.None; Here is the property public csMeterStyle.grfxAlarms MeterAlarm { get { return mtrAlarm; } set { mtrAlarm = value; DrawObject(); } } Here is the class that contains the property type. THis is just bel;ow the namespace decleration on the control. public class csMeterStyle { public enum Orientation { UpDown = 0, LeftRight = 2 } public enum grfx3DStyle { Flat = 0, Shaded = 1, Line = 2 } public enum grfxQuality { HighQuality = 0, AntiAlias = 1, HighSpeed = 2, DefaultQuality = 3, None = 4 } public enum grfxState { None = 0, NotAuthorized = 1, NotPreset = 2, PresetInProgress = 3, LowFLowStart = 4, HighFlow = 5, LowFlowStop = 6, BatchStopped = 7, BatchEnded = 8, Failed = 9 } public enum grfxGround { None = 0, NotGrounded = 1, Grounded = 2, Emergency = 3 } public enum grfxAlarms { None = 0, FlowAlarm = 1, AdtvAlarm = 2, BlendAlarm = 3, OverfillAlarm = 4, Printer = 5 } public enum grfxType { FlowMeter=0, Propeller=1 } public enum grfxDirection { Left = 0, Right = 1, Up = 2, Down = 3 } } The problem that I am getting is when I drop the Custom Control on a Form and then view the all Tasks, in the initialize Component code, where the code is setting the value of the custom property, it gives me this error :The variable 'grfxAlarms' is either undeclared or was never assigned. What am I doing wrong here, this stuff works great in VB.net.