My well intentioned daily blogging was rudely interrupted by life some time ago, and since then has struggled to return. To be honest, the only reason I am blogging now is because everyone in the house is still in bed asleep and not needing my attention! It is nice to have a moment to myself - plus the sun is shining and the nights are getting lighter thanks to our wonderful 'British Summer Time' (long may it continue, controversial though it is!)
Over a month ago I decided to run a little experiment after getting yet another huge electricity bill after we had tried all last year to reduce it. As we now read the meter every month and are billed just for what we use I declaired we would not use the dryer for 1 whole month and just see what, if any difference it made. I would not say we were excessive users, I always used the line if the conditions were right and the radiators were used etc if needed, and people always told me driers were expensive to run - but I had no idea just HOW expensive!
At the end of the month I submitted my reading. My bill came in....£88.00 cheaper!
so over 12 months I could be saving £800 - £1000!
The day after the bill Mr Fig dragged the dryer out of the shed and dismantled it - salvaging parts for his projects, taking the rest to the recycling center and replanting our pyrocantha that had eaten the wooden barrel it stood in - into the huge drum!
I know there are going to be times when the house is full of damp washing and we struggle to get it dry, but that is hardly a true hardship - and I am willing to live with it gladly now I know just how much money I have wasted just to 'make life easy'
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A few weeks ago I signed up to a local 'Arts on Prescription' course. It is free, with a suggested donation, and runs every Thursday afternoon for 16 weeks. For me it is a gorgeous drive to Nelson on the other side of Pendle Hill to our village - and every week we have done a different craft - PERFECT!
So far we have done Iris paper folding, Bonding Fibers, Batik and my new favorite hobby, BOOK BINDING - we learned 2 simple techniques, Pamphlet binding and Japanese Stab stitching. I came home incredibly enthused and decided to incorporate my love of knitting, need to use up bits of yarn and new found skills to create lots of - BOOKS! - I love it!
These are a couple of tiny books I finished from a yarn sample pack I bought about 10 years ago!
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Finally (before the household awakes) I made it into the CRAFT SELLER magazine - If yo have a copy of issue 9 I am at the top of page 89 - but even better than that, as I was setting up my stall at a local fair on Saturday, the lady at the next stall recognized me from the mag - how cool is that!
3 comments:
I love your wrapped little books, so beautiful! And I have never had a drier and people think I'm mad but it suits us and now I know it saves us some pennies too :)
xxx
Nice to see you back.
I love your little book covers.
I know what you mean about tumble dryers! I have one, I have to say I do use it.....once a week......so perhaps I can cut it to none per week!! I only dry smalls in mine rest of the washing is lined or clothes-horse dried!
Julie xxxxxxxxx
Love your little books. I've never had a dryer, always dry stuff on the line or on clothes horse over the bath. I'v never had the room or desire for one - you can't miss what you've never had.
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