We’re always looking for new ways to save money and a few weeks ago Zach had the brilliant idea that we should start hanging our laundry out to dry. He’d talked about doing it a little before, but there wasn’t a great place for us to set up clothes lines in our yard. The difference this time was that he came up with a place for the lines — our back porch! Since he set them up we’ve barely dried any laundry in the dryer. I’m quite looking forward to the savings on our power bill next month. We’re also feeling very smug about doing our laundry in an environmentally friendly way. When I smell a neighbor’s dryer running I think, “Well hmmm, hmmm, hmmm — look who’s destroying the planet! At least I’m doing my part to stop the polar ice caps from melting.” Of course, I was also drying my laundry in a dryer up until 3 weeks ago, so you should roll your eyes right now, Internet.

There are a couple of down-sides to this air drying business. The first is that none of us are that into crunchy bath towels. One of life’s great pleasures is stepping out of the shower and burying your wet face in a soft, warm bath towel and for now that joy is gone for us. Does anyone of my three or four readers know how to make your air-dried towels fluffy? I’d love to hear about it.

Another problem is that we tend to buy clothes in sizes that can shrink up a bit in the dryer and still fit comfortably. No dryer means no shrinkage though, so we all have a few pieces of clothing that we’re swimming around in. On the plus side, that does make us feel waifish and thin.

This page is a direct knock-off of a Cathy Zielske layout I saw in Simple Scrapbooks. I can’t remember which issue it was, but it was a recent one where she did the section openers. I really like this one because it’s so simple and I get to show off a bunch of cute papers.

This was the first time I’ve used these felt letters. They’re insanely cute, but they don’t stick very well. I’ve already had to apply extra adhesive to a couple of them and I think it’s just a matter of time before I do the rest of them.

And isn’t this picture of Wyatt great? He decided he needed to take this armful of books to the playground with him which is pretty sweet, but the sunglasses are what push it over the edge for me.

Supplies — paper and felt letters and stuff — are all KI Memories. Cardstock is Bazzil.

The woman who lived in our house before us was an avid gardener and we have around a dozen large rose bushes in our backyard. Last year we didn’t really get our act together to care for them properly, but we still managed to get a number of lovely bouquets of flowers from them. This year, Zach and I decided that we didn’t want the death of these decades old, beloved rose bushes on our hands so we got the Sunset Roses book and figured out what we needed to do. After a little pruning and a little rose food, the bushes exploded with flowers. For the past few weeks we’ve been harvesting extravagant bouquets of roses nearly every day. There are too many for our house, so I’ve been taking them to work for my desk and handing them out to my co-workers. I can’t get over the luxury of it all. I wish I could send Molly a thank you note to let her know how much I appreciate and enjoy her fantastic flowers.

Hey, look at me! I just finished a crossword puzzle. Of course, I had access to an answer key when I got stuck, but I did get most of it on my own. Maybe I’m not as dumb as I thought….

I just got back from a totally fun, geeky evening. My friend from work, Ellen, invited me to go see Will Shortz speak at Zellerbach Hall on the UC campus. Will Shortz, for those of you who don’t know, is an acclaimed enigmatologist and the editor of The New York Times crossword puzzle.

He started the evening by giving a quick run-down of some of his favorite crosswords published in the Times and a brief list of what he looks for in a puzzle. Then he moved on to a brief history of the crossword puzzle. I was surprised to learn that it’s a 20th century invention. I also didn’t know that a crossword puzzle book was what launched the Simon & Schuster publishing company. After a question and answer session, he started the real fun of the night — the audience participation puzzles. I loved hearing the puzzles and all the answers, but I felt kind of dumb because I rarely got any of the answers. My favorite game of the night was one where he would say a phrase that rhymed with a famous person’s name and we had to guess who he was referring to. Some of the ones I got were “weight loss” (Kate Moss) and “spruce tree” (Bruce Lee). The biggest laugh of the evening came with one of these clues — “dirt pile”. There were 3 or 4 audience members playing that round and none of them could figure it out. Finally one of them blurted out “George Bush!” It brought the house down. (The answer was Kurt Weill.)

I’m not good at crosswords at all and it drives me absolutely crazy. I like words. I like puzzles. I like word puzzles. I think I’m a fairly intelligent, I have a good vocabulary and I’m culturally literate. But every time I attempt a crossword — even the one in the TV Guide or the in-flight magazine — I get smacked down. My mother, who does a crossword almost every day, tells me that the best way to get good at them is to do a lot of them because after a while you start to learn how the constructors think. After tonight, I think I want to try to take on the challenge of doing crosswords.

But maybe I’ll start off with the Monday puzzles….

Here’s the page I was talking about yesterday. It’s my favorite one I’ve made in a long time.

Junkitz paper, American Crafts rub-ons and no Cricut.