Line Drying 101

Emily Jo "Expert Line Dryer"

Lesson in preparation for Bolivian living part 2!
I love hanging my clothes out to dry. In fact for a birthday gift a few years back the only thing I wanted was a sturdy clothes line. Rudi inlisted Cousin Erwin to weld the metal parts and drill the holes for the lines to go through. It is very deluxe and every summer I dry the majority of my clothes on it! It is a real luxury! However, having the option of a dryer on overcast or cold or rainy days is also a luxury...
When we designed our home we did not forsee the problem of having our dryer on an inside wall. The venting takes all kinds of twists and turns to go under and out of the house. There is at least fifteen feet of pipe before it hits the outside. It is a real labarynth of lint collecting possibilities! When our loads began to take three hours to dry we started looking into a possible remodel to put the dryer on the outside wall. When we asked Paul Williams to do the remodel for us he suggested something called a booster fan. It is designed for apartment buildings, hotels, etc, where having a dryer on an outside wall is not an option. We decided that this would be the best idea rather than a costly remodel  and it has been. The fan comes on when the dryer starts and pushes the air and lint out. Our drying times went back down to normal and Mama was happy again! Wellll, about the time we started to consider going to Bolivia our dryer fan has started acting up. It now acts as a giant plug to the "labaryth" and drying times have sky rocketed again. My amazing-in-everyway-husband, but not a "fix-it" guy, began to try to get the thing fixed.... Well, come the beginning of June we decided that for the sake of our electric bill and not wanting to burn the house down with a dryer fire, we should go to ALL line drying.  Line drying in Western Oregon is wonderful in the dead of summer but the other months can be rainy and cold, which is how June was!  You could find me outside between rain showers either putting up or taking down in a hurry the clothes... I have thought numerous times "this is what it could be like in Bolivia". What a great opportunity God has given me to get me ready for a place where I might not have the luxury of a dryer. Forced clothesline drying 101 is going great and the word is that a booster fan part is on the way.... My drying situation might get fixed before we leave, but maybe God has other plans!
P.S. The vent fan did get fixed thanks to my TRULY amazing-husband-in-every-way, but now it seems that the dryer itself is having revenge on me for the million loads I have put it through and will not dry a load faster than 3 hours....eeeks.... Bolivia here we come!