The picture you are seeing right now is one of the best I've ever taken. Not for quality purposes, simply because it means we got a new dishwasher! No more pruney hands for me. For the past couple months or so, I have been doing all the dishes by hand and definitely not enjoying it. It didn't have to go on for this long. Colby had actually bought one to surprise me for Valentine's Day, but I ended up finding out a couple of days before. We got to talking and he wanted to make sure he was doing the right thing without actually giving the secret away. Since money isn't flowing freely around here, he wanted to confirm that he should spend the money on a dishwasher instead of putting it on debt. So he finally told me what he had bought and I told him that I had heard of a few different things we could try to see if we could fix it ourselves. Maybe it was just buildup in the water hoses and we could fix it for a lot cheaper. So we decided to return the washer and I proceeded to find a solution myself. It worked for about 2 or 3 washes and then started to not function anymore. So we were back to square one. At least the timing worked out, we ended up getting a bigger tax refund than expected and so we went back to Sears and bought it again. It is one of the best gifts ever! Washing dishes by hand for a family of 3 wasn't horrible, but I'm sure if we had a few more kids, we would only have gone a few days without a dishwasher!
Now that I don't have to wash dishes by hand anymore, that means I have lots more time for crafting. Yay!!! Not that I need it, I seem to find time no matter how busy I am. The other day I made another trash bag for my mom's car, a grocery bag holder and a sandwich bag. All in one day! I was finally fed up with stuffing the grocery bags under the kitchen sink and having them spill out whenever I opened the cabinet. For the most part, we use reusable bags for this reason alone. We were collecting them a lot faster than we were using them. Now they will be neat and tidy hanging on the inside of the cabinet. As for the sandwich bag, I am quite proud of myself for this creation. I had seen a pattern on a blog a while back, but for the life of me, I could not find it again. So, I went ahead and made what I thought would be a funtional bag for Colby to use for his lunches. I was remarkably surprised how it turned out, Colby was equally impressed. I'm not a complete tree hugger, but I like to try and recylce whenever I can or just not use so much plastic in the first place. This will be a reusable and washable bag that can last for a long time. And I can admire my own handy work! My next attempt at a new project is going to be a quilt. Hopefully it will look good enough to post pictures. Stay tuned.