whoops...

I didn't get a post in for the month of February so blew that new year's resolution. Last weekend I had a great time when I went out dancing last weekend with my high school class mates. I also cleaned the National Arlington sewing machine head. This weekend I'm spending home doing some chores. I hope to put away the contents of three boxes of antiques. These are the kitchenalia items that I used to have hanging on my kitchen walls and on top of my many cupboards in the old house. In this home, not sure what I will do as surely, not enough room for everything.

When I took pictures of the Arlington, I was surprised when I saw this gorgeous picture of Phoebe looking out the window.

My washer is on the fritz. I knew it hadn't been cleaning clothes as well as I think it should so I'd spent a lot of time lately babying it along by turning the knob to run through the wash cycle twice and the rinse cycle twice, and restarting the final spin. The dryer won't dry in the first run, so we end up running it through again and then it seems to 'cook' your clothes. These are the washer and dryer Phil bought brand new nearly 20 years ago. We are adamant about cleaning the filters, and even wash the dryer filter because we use fabric softener. We can't see wasting anymore energy on the old machines, the parts to repair them are outrageous, and yet, can't see going without and using public laundry. So, we did our homework and shopped around and put a washer and dryer on layaway. This is big! Huge!! I've never had a brand new washer and dryer. I also searched around for local sales of newer models folks were selling, but what I found were the trouble models that did poorly in the Consumer's Reports ratings. We are getting a front-load washer, the basic GE model. They don't have a fancy name, but these are the ones that are recommended by Consumer's Reports and are supposed to meet all of our needs. I want something that cleans and cleans well. We don't have to go for the greatest and best features and buttons, but we want to get the best for our money and we want capacity. We did consider the high efficiency top loaders, but when we found out you still have to pack your clothes around the center nubby agitator or it will get off balanced, and therefore, you can't put as much in it as they claim. We decided to spend the same amount of money on a front-loader.

We also decided to paint the walls of this tiny laundry room. So, I don't know yet if I will like it as I usually paint in some kind of green, but I choose a bright sunny yellow with a bit of orange in it. I figure a laundry room has to be bright and sunny. The floor has a couple tears in it, so decided to get some of those stick on vinyl tiles for something different and minimal in cost. Here's what I came up with. I figure if the yellow is too much, I can always repaint it a lighter color It is called Sunset Glow...and glow it does! Certainly lends it itself to more enjoyment of doing the dratted chore of laundry. Another thing we did was remove the door to the laundry room. Wow, it opened up that room completely! We never close it because that is where the cat boxes reside.