{"id":1223,"date":"2012-07-19T09:28:35","date_gmt":"2012-07-19T14:28:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/?p=1223"},"modified":"2012-07-18T23:32:25","modified_gmt":"2012-07-19T04:32:25","slug":"major-moms-back-to-basics-campaign-30-days-almost-dryer-free","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/07\/major-moms-back-to-basics-campaign-30-days-almost-dryer-free.html","title":{"rendered":"Major Mom&#8217;s &#8220;Back to Basics&#8221; Campaign: 30 Days (Almost) Dryer-Free!"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_1224\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/AmishClothesline.jpeg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1224\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1224 \" title=\"AmishClothesline\" src=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/AmishClothesline.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"293\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1224\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Scenes like this grace the countryside throughout Lancaster County, and it got me thinking about line-drying our own clothes.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Just before I left for vacation in June, we got a power bill and it was a doozie! The weather had been warm so the air conditioner had been running at full-tilt, but as I always do after a higher-than-normal electric bill, I start to look for where to trim the excess power consumption:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Close my garage door: I have a habit of leaving our garage door open. \u00a0The morning sun comes screaming in heating up the space. \u00a0This makes our garage fridge work harder.<\/li>\n<li>Turn off extra lights. \u00a0MOST of our house uses CFL lightbulbs, but not all of them. \u00a0The bathrooms have many\u00a0incandescent\u00a0bulbs and we need to be better about turning them off.<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t use my big oven when I can use my toaster oven to do the same job. \u00a0If I&#8217;m just baking chicken breasts, I can pop them in <a href=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2008\/03\/support-assistance-request.html\">our smaller toaster oven<\/a>, which does the same job in a smaller space.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But the biggest &#8212; or at least a top 3 &#8212; culprit is probably our clothes dryer. \u00a0I saw a couple friends take part in a 30-Day Dryer Challenge earlier this year and at the time I thought to myself &#8220;No! \u00a0Never!&#8221;, but after (a) this past power bill and (b) driving through the back roads of Lancaster County on a laundry day, I began to mellow to the thought.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/michaelbluejay.com\/electricity\/howmuch.html\"><!--more-->This website offers a lot of statistics and tips about home electricity use<\/a>. Pay no attention to creepy Mr. Electricity on the left-hand side. I&#8217;m not sold on the clothes washer using more energy than the dryer &#8212; I rarely use hot water to wash. I have a &#8220;sanitary&#8221; cycle on my washer which raises the wash water to 200F to kill germs on linens. I only use it every second or third washing for our bedding. Otherwise, I wash with warm and cold water.<\/p>\n<p>I didn&#8217;t formally commit to a 30-Day Challenge, but I did think I could change our clothes dryer habits.<\/p>\n<p>When I was in West Virginia, my Dad took Dave and me to Costco and I found <a href=\"http:\/\/reviews.costco.com\/2070\/11510163\/greenway-greenway-home-products-x-large-stainless-steel-fold-away-laundry-rack-reviews\/reviews.htm\">this awesome drying rack<\/a> (which appears to not be for sale at Costco anymore). \u00a0It turns out this can hold a whole load of the kids&#8217; laundry!<\/p>\n<p>Dave and I got home on June 20th and I&#8217;ve only needed to use the dryer\u00a0<em>four times\u00a0<\/em>in the past 30 days. \u00a0And really it&#8217;s more like 37 days because we didn&#8217;t use the dryer while on vacation, of course. \u00a0And that was due to bad weather keeping me from hanging the clothes outside.<\/p>\n<p>For the most part, it isn&#8217;t any more difficult to drape my clothing on those racks than it is to move it from my washer to my dryer. It&#8217;s probably an additional 5 minutes per load of laundry. In trying to simplify my life, I don&#8217;t mind this.<\/p>\n<p>I can now fold the clothes as I take them off the drying racks and I can even pick the the clothes off the racks in the order I choose: pants, then shirts, then pajamas, then underclothing, then socks. (That&#8217;s the order I always fold our clothing, actually&#8230;largest to smallest items.)<\/p>\n<p>The kids can help &#8212; they&#8217;ve only been home a few days, so I&#8217;ve yet to send them outside with a load, but if my sister can enlist her sons&#8217; help with their clothesline, I think my kids will be inspired also.<\/p>\n<p>My only complaint about this method is that the towels come in pretty stiff after hanging outside. I have to admit that the trip through the dryer, especially with one of those &#8220;Bounce&#8221; sheets, makes a far softer product. But no one else seems to mind&#8230;or at least they aren&#8217;t complaining to me vocally.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1225\" style=\"width: 586px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/ClothesDryingRack.jpeg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1225\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-1225 \" title=\"ClothesDryingRack\" src=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/ClothesDryingRack.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"576\" height=\"432\" srcset=\"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/ClothesDryingRack.jpeg 960w, http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/ClothesDryingRack-300x225.jpeg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 576px) 100vw, 576px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1225\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">I don&#8217;t have enough features in my backyard to string up a clothesline, but one day I want one of those Amish-style ones that rises high over the lawn so the boys can still play&#8230;<\/p><\/div>\n<p>I haven&#8217;t received the latest electric bill yet. It&#8217;s been very hot here so I am fearing that the cost savings from not using the dryer might get sucked into additional air conditioning costs. I&#8217;ll let you know!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Just before I left for vacation in June, we got a power bill and it was a doozie! The weather had been warm so the air conditioner had been running at full-tilt, but as I always do after a higher-than-normal electric bill, I start to look for where to trim the excess power consumption: Close [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1],"tags":[255,275,33],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5ycQ0-jJ","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1341,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/08\/lacewing-and-slime-mold.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":0},"title":"Lacewing and Slime Mold","date":"13 August 12","format":false,"excerpt":"What??? Yeah...um...I had a good old time today photographing assorted stuff with the new camera while I was doing lawn work. \u00a0First of all, this lacewing has been sitting all day on our door from the garage into the house. I'm starting to dabble a little with the post-processing that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"bugs\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/LAcewing-1024x678.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3779,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2015\/05\/diy-kitchen-transformation-cabinet-paint.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":1},"title":"DIY Kitchen Transformation: Painting the Rest of the Cabinets","date":"17 May 15","format":false,"excerpt":"This weekend we are painting the cabinets. This is a much larger undertaking than the island we did last month. Instead of just the four doors we had to disassemble for the island, today we took down 28 doors! Taking down and preparing the doors took a couple hours alone\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"diy kitchen transformation\"","img":{"alt_text":"No turning back now! This is after the primer only. The real paint goes on tomorrow.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/IMG_1548-1024x768.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":169,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2008\/06\/168-oz.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":2},"title":"168 oz.","date":"30 June 08","format":false,"excerpt":"That's how much beer I just dumped down our kitchen sink.My current mission: To combine the contents of our garage fridge with our kitchen fridge. The garage fridge is moving with us to NE, while the kitchen fridge will stay here, so I need to get the thing emptied and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"moving\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":468,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2010\/09\/let-the-games-begin-vollmer-pcs-2010.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":3},"title":"Let The Games Begin &#8212; Vollmer PCS* 2010","date":"27 September 10","format":false,"excerpt":"*Glossary: PCS: Permanant Change of StationDon't fret, we still have a few weeks.Eight, to be exact. Almost exact: 8 weeks from Tuesday the 28th.Yep. My brain has officially shifted into \"Prepare to Move\" mode. This is becoming old hat for me. Let me set the stage here. I grew up\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"air force\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":496,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2010\/12\/its-a-great-day-in-the-vollmer-house.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":4},"title":"It&#8217;s a GREAT DAY in the Vollmer House","date":"23 December 10","format":false,"excerpt":"After some 3 years of trying, Jacob finally got the hang of riding his bike! He said that the hills in Nebraska made it really hard, and to be honest, he simply wasn't as interested. But with only about 2 minutes of holding on, he took off with ease this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"parenting\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":210,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2008\/08\/clean-up-clean-up-everybody-clean-up.html","url_meta":{"origin":1223,"position":5},"title":"Clean Up, Clean Up, Everybody Clean Up!","date":"13 August 08","format":false,"excerpt":"Today, after a VERY long bike ride during which I got extremely lost in an effort to help find Dave a safe bike route to work (by the way, it can't be done without riding all over highway interchanges), I continued the finer points of unpacking our house.First off, the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"crafts\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1223"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1223"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1226,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1223\/revisions\/1226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}