New arrivals

So, I'd like to introduce the new arrivals to the Dough fam.

Yes, this is indeed a post about laundry. If you know me well, you know I have laundry stuffed in every room in our house. Since we left Arizona we've had a string of small/ineffective washer-dryer combos. With three little girls, we just never were able to keep up with it. Ever.

Our dryer was taking 4 cycles to dry a small load, and this is after we had it cleaned out. So a load of laundry took about 3-4 hours - and that's if I remembered to restart the dryer.

Now - we got a smoking deal on this set and whoa Nelly (yeah, I said whoa Nelly... what's your point?) what an upgrade. We went from a small top loader (about 10 years old with a broken control panel) that we bought off a friend that was moving for $25 (she threw in the dryer for free - which will tell you what the dryer is worth) to a large capacity front loading washing machine. I can't even tell you how much more laundry we can do in each load. About three times as much laundry - that's how much.

The new dryer - it dries! It is an energy saver model, so we can choose for it to run longer on a lower setting which adds to the drying time, but still - it takes about an hour to dry a full (really big!!) load versus 2-3 hours.

The best part - I can't believe how clean the clothes are. I didn't realize how ineffective our old washer was until we started seeing what this new one can do. Stains are disappearing and Anna's sleeves are CLEAN! That's huge.

This weekend we reached the end of the laundry pile. The END. As in - we cleaned out all the laundry from the dark crevices of baskets long forgotten. The laundry is caught up. We are only washing now what we take off of our bodies. That's huge. We haven't had that in five years.

I was able to fill two big garbage bags full of donate-able clothes. I also filled a bin of clothes that Julia and Anna had grown out of and are ready to be passed down. With all the clothes clean and in the drawer, it also makes it easy to plan for their summer wardrobes as I can see what the girls clearly need and what they don't now.

Sigh... I'm in love.

Well, if you managed to get this far, thanks. I know reading about laundry is about as much fun as doing laundry. Although, right now, doing laundry just isn't all that bad.

Kidlets

Julia is playing lots of softball, she's become quite the pitcher and really enjoys the positive attention she's getting for it. She had her LL evaluations last week, and we're just waiting to find out if they are moving her to the majors this year.

Julia and Emma have been added to the family members that wear glasses. Both will need them for just school work for now. Julia was so excited about the possibility of glasses until they became a reality. Gotta love these little life lessons.

Anna continues to blow us away with her improvements at school. She went from a struggling level 1-2 reader at the beginning of the year to reaching level 15 (the top level before chapter books) this month. She's very proud of herself, and can read just about whatever we put in front of her. She's definitely ready for 2nd grade now!

Emma just had her 5th birthday - which means that she's heading of to the big K in the Fall. I'm excited for her, as I know she will adore it - but oh my. This momma's not ready to send her off on that big yellow bus yet. I'm glad I have 5 months to prepare.

Things are crazy here. As in C R A Z Y.

I'm going to fess up. I failed my test AGAIN. By one point. yes. one point folks. So - I'm just a little bit of a failure. :) I'm going to take it again soon - I'm just not sure when.

Why?

Because we leave tomorrow morning for 2 weeks in Arizona. I can't wait. We had a huge storm here this weekend and have about a foot of snow on the ground. I love the snow and it does so much for my holiday spirit - but it will be here when we get back.

Thursday was a suckfest. I failed my test. Then it snowed and snowed - we ended up with about 4 inches. Then later that evening I was walking over to my neighbors house and literally fell upon her doorstep. I was carrying Em and so I had to do some serious contorsions to avoid falling on her and landed directly on my elbow. OUCH. Em was fine but I ended up at the doctor. They were going to send me for Xrays on Friday - but when I woke up I could move it - so I chose to skip the Xrays. My entire body is sore, and Friday was a litle scary since I was dealing with extreme dizziness but I'm on the mend.

We had our family Christmas here Saturday night. It was nice - the girls loved their presents and we spent all night singing to High School Musical Sing It. Holy hell that's fun.

So, we're getting ready to leave. I have about 10 loads of laundry to catch up on since Thursday and packing and cleaning. We're so lucky to have such great neighbors as they will be watching our place and taking care of the cat.

Well - I have to get back to work. Kids are screaming, laundry needs washing and folding and there has to be some sort of packing going on soon!

Do a little dance...

My washer and dryer arrived today. WHEW. These girls accumulate a lot of clothes in 4 days. They said they didn't know how long it would take to get in. I'm impressed with 1 business day.

The nice guy installed it, and I ran my first load of laundry (using the Tide with Bleach sample (what kind of detergent do you use??? Fabric softener or dryer sheets?). It worked fine until the spin cycle.

OH MY.

The racket this thing caused. I've had washers that have "walked" a bit. This thing was beating down the door to come out. It didn't help that it's on concrete floor, but I'm serious, I was certain it was possessed.

When the guy came back to attach the dryer, I told him it was making noise. He said that a certain amount of noise was expected. I didn't bother to argue... I simply turned the washer back on. It made him jump back!

Apparently there is a rod they insert to keep the drum still during transit. He hadn't removed it.

The washer finished in quiet.

I no longer have to trudge down to the dark, wet basement carrying armloads of loads down steep narrow stairs. I no longer have a washer the size of a bathroom sink. We're talking about doing a load with more than just one sheet washing at a time!

Ahhhhh.