Big Success!

I feel like I whine a lot on here.  I complain about how I should be doing something that I'm not, point out how the conventional way is bad and the road less traveled is better.  I think it can be kind of negative.  But not today!  Today it's all positive!

A few weeks ago I blogged about what I called The Christine Project.  It's my one-woman movement to decrease my family's electricity consumption by not using my clothes dryer as much.  (Named after a friend of mine who line dries most of her clothes.) I decided to try it for one month and see how it went.  Well, ladies and gentlemen (most likely, gentleman--I'm pretty sure my male reader ship is low) that month is up and the results are in!

First, I love line drying my clothes!  While I thought it would take MORE time to do my laundry, it actually takes less.  When I pull clothes out of the washer I put them directly on the drying racks and then from the drying racks to the laundry baskets.  There's never a big mess of laundry that's waiting to be folded.  Since everything is hanging up, it's faster and easier for me to sort it by family member which makes it easier to put away. 
I was surprised how quickly things dried!  I thought jeans and sweatshirts might take a day at least, but sometimes I can hang them up before bed and by the time I'm ready to do laundry in the AM, they're ready to be folded.  I will say that I need to plan my loads of laundry though.  I don't line dry the towels because I don't have the room to hang them and they DO take a long time, so I have to do a load of something that hangs, then towels or diapers (they take a few times through the washer so it gives the clothes on the line time to dry) then back to a load of something that hangs.  I'm not falling behind with my laundry at all and I feel good about not using the dryer as much.
Here's the biggest success:my electric bill.  Last month my electric bill was $197.  This month-- drum roll please.....$120!  I don't think that my project was responsible for the entire drop in electric costs (after all, that last bill included Christmas lights) but there's no denying that he helped...a lot! 
So I'm going to keep line drying.  It's better for my clothes (all that heat beats them up) better for my wallet (what am I going to do with that $77?!?!) and better for the planet.  See, I TOLD you it was a positive blog!