It's a drizzly day in the North Woods. Mr. Mac and I have a day without the responsibility of children at home ... a day to go to town ... to purchase a sink to set up outside near the garden with a little weatherproof counter space to handle the dirty work of cleaning garden produce.
I have a gift card from last Mother's Day (my kids know me well) that I hope to use on a new clothesline to put up behind the garage. It should be a more presentable way to hang laundry ... last year we had a rag-tag line poorly strung up ... not too neat or tidy ... a bit reminiscent of tent camping. Without a fenced yard .. it was a bit hillbilly
ish;)
One more comment about laundry: About a year ago we stopped using liquid fabric softener and dryer fabric sheets ... and bleach for whites. Half of the year we used two tablespoons of concentrated powder laundry soap (from Costco) ... the other half we used a homemade liquid or powder soap. Both Costco and the homemade soaps performed about the same. The laundry seemed a bit dingy until we recently began adding 1/2 cup of white vinegar to the washing machine's fabric softener dispenser. I must admit ... the whites are now as white as when we used bleach ... and after nearly a year without the addition of commercial softeners, our clothes have no residue making them come out of the wash much cleaner than imagined. Another bonus is how clean the washing machine appears inside ... not all greasy-gray from the Downey softener. More money in the bank! (For soap recipes ... check the sidebar)
Mr. Mac asked recently what I wanted for my birthday. I think the requested gift cost a whole $5 ... but the effort he made blessed my heart. Having a keen fondness for saving zip lock plastic bags for reuse, my counter often has bags drying upside down over various objects. I present to you my new-fangled heart shaped bag drying rack. Ta-dah!
