Dance of the sugar Plum Fairies on Glass Harp

WOW.

Wallet-friendly, eco-friendly fabric softener alternative

I was reading The Simple Dollar the other day and they mentioned using white vinegar as a fabric softener alternative. They did a comparison of costs for it, and the cost-worthiness of it over fabric softener boiled down to "depends on how much you use". The prescribed substitution use is "one cup of white vinegar per load". I'm assuming that is for a top-loader, which uses much more water, detergent and fabric softener. I decided to give it a try.

I used as much white vinegar in my (front-loader) machine as I usually use fabric softener. When the load was done, my laundry smelled...nice. CLEAN without all the overwhelming fake-floral scents of commercial fabric softener. Nice! Soft? Yeah, not a bad job, and considering that I usually only add fabric softener because otherwise our laundry smells horrible (like musty old water).

Considering that using fabric softener means I'm either oiling my clothes (liquid) or waxing them (dryer sheets), neither of which is environmentally friendly and is kind of disgusting when you think about it, I think that white vinegar is a good alternative, and one I think we'll be using a lot more in the future.
And to keep clothes from getting all staticky in the dryer, I highly recommend dryer balls.

Cool, free stuff!

I was looking through Craigslist the other day to see if we could find a new phone for Kev for cheap. His got wet a while ago, and while it still mostly works, it's developed a few...quirks. So since it's not urgent that we get him a new phone, I'm trolling Craigslist to see if we can find an acceptable one for cheap. I know, good luck.

While I was looking in the "electronics" section, I saw someone listed a Garmin GPS for $15. Really? Well, okay, it's a GPS / PDA (Garmin plus Palm) and it's kinda old, but hey, it's newer than the ones we have. So we drove out to meet the owner and check out the possible purchase of a "new" PDA. Unfortunately it wasn't charged. At all. So we couldn't verify that it worked. After some discussion, the owner offered to take it and charge it and if it worked we could arrange to meet her in Auburn to buy it, but she decided that she really didn't want to make the trip out to Auburn, so she said, "how about you just take it. It's only $15. if it works, great, if not, well, I'm sorry for wasting your time."

We got it back home, charged it overnight, and....it works! Yay!

Then we were helping with the Church Cleanout on Saturday, and I heard one of the guys talking about Walnuts. Baroo? Walnuts? Turns out he has several Black Walnut Trees and offered to give me a bunch of walnuts. So I got some yesterday, and apparently we may get more today.

Incidentally, one needs to let Black Walnuts sit for about 2 weeks after peeling them before cracking. Right after the green husk comes off is something I would not touch on a bet. Ew.

Jeremy had fun up north!

Jeremy loves to herd his Kong.

Happy Anniversary, Sweetie

I love you...

Plant a tree - for free!

Odwalla is sponsoring a "vote for your state to plant a tree" campaign. Just click here: http://www.odwalla.com/plantatree then follow the instructions on their website to have them donate money to plant a tree in YOUR state!

Mimi Burns Band

Attention, Celtic Rock fans: the Mimi Burns Band will be playing at Come2Go at 323 West Baker St. in Fort Wayne, starting at 7:00pm on Saturday, March 5. They'll be recording for their upcoming DVD. Everybody come and be loud! They'll also be collecting a free-will donation for a group that's working in Haiti: http://www.echonet.org/

Here's a sample of their music: "Gypsy Dance".

Jeremy in the Snow

Jeremy had a great deal of fun on Vacation. He discovered that SNOW, when deep enough, will aid his research into AntiGravity Experiments.
By which I mean that he had a blast hurling himself into the air and landing in snowdrifts deep enough to bury himself in. He bounded through the snow, chased it, dug in it, and generally had a Very Good Time. He was really bummed when we came home - not enough snow, and of course we left my mom and dad -- his NEW FAVORITE PEOPLE -- behind.

Here's a few pix of him enjoying himself in the snow.

The Muppets and "Popcorn"

Enjoy!