We have a local pediatrician that does di-chro jewelry. He wears pins and stuff everyday at work and has given lots of it to his nurses and receptionists, who also wear it frequently. He gets lots of questions about the jewelry, and people always want to know where he gets it (most of what he wears is very whimsical). Several years ago he began to have an open house at his own home in early December to sell his jewelry (he and his daughter make it all). They invited their co-workers and friends and just served cookies, crackers, cheese, and punch. They told everyone to bring friends. Every year it has grown and last year they probably had a few hundred people go through their doors. I love his stuff and do lots of gift buying there every year, buying about 20 pieces per year. They now have picture frames, serving utensils, sculptures, and lots of jewelry priced mostly from $10-100, but some a little more. People get there early, waiting outside, to get first pick of everything. Most everyone there purchases at least $100 or more. I get compliments on his jewelry all year long and tell people where it comes from and they ask how they can get invited to this "exclusive" party. I just tell them to call his clinic and they will give them the date and time.

Interesting - I have pondered the apparent waste of heat in winter from vented dryers - I've seen various versions of the diverters but agree, moisture dust and detergent fumes are the issue. Having said that, most Australian homes do not seem to have any requirement for outside venting for dryers - they don't seem to use gas dryers at all of course, and their electricity supply is already 240v - it's mostly a very humid climate, at least on the coast so from that point of view it's insane. Mould is definitely an issue there, the heat is a good thing since what heat people use in winter tends to be rather inefficient non-central heat, but reverse cycle air conditioning is getting bigger there and is probably the most efficient answer since you get more heat from it than you would from plain electric heating alone, and the outside temps lend themselves to rc heat year-round. I have contemplated some form of heat exchange also and pretty much came up with the idea of one pipe within another as the solution, but added a tapered fin to the cold air pipe, with the low side outside for the condensation. If you went with pvc which would be a little less effective for the condensation you might be able to do a variation on the combo inlet/outlet they use for high efficiency furnaces. I hadn't considered using outside air for make up air for the dryer or going direct to the dryer....the only advantage would be it's dehumidified air. A dryer is probably less efficient at heating that air going in, especially if the house is heated by reverse cycle/heat pump or geothermal, in which case I suppose the most efficient thing of all would be air drying indoors. Australians and NZers use clotheslines a lot more than we do in North America and I was a proponent of them when I lived in both countries, but was one of the few who vented their dryer outside. As for the condensing dryers they do seem to have the same current draw as the conventional ones (bosch 240v/13a) but I have not yet figured out whether they would be net more efficient, or less. One thing is, perhaps they are going to be blowing dehumidified air, I'm not sure. I imagine air passes over the warm coils, into the dryer, exits via the cool coils, condensing the moisture, then into a reservoir and is pumped into a drain. I guess that would be a cheap source of demineralised water for car radiators, batteries etc....provided it wasn't too mouldy/ucky. When I had a dehumidifier in Australia, I kept it pretty clean and would bottle the collected water when I needed it. True, the condensing dryer would be drawing from the household air, cooling it somewhat, but owing to natural inefficiencies, etc there will be a net gain of heat overall, like if you had a refrigerator. Since there is no outside vent, there won't be the same heat loss, and when you consider how most dryer vents actually allow a fair amount of cold ingress (my dryer is very cold inside when it's not in use) you might be a fair bit better off. On the same sort of note, it would be nice to have some sort of winter/summer arrangement so you could draw cold into the fridge system in winter, and exhaust the heat out in summer. Apparently heat recovery units on air conditioners are quite common and in summer you can use them to heat your hot water (some sort of water jacket arrangement on the compressor outside.) I suppose for that matter you could use a similar arrangement for a clothes dryer or a 'drying room' but a clothesline would be a lot simpler. I agree North Americans are really sucked into the dryer only thing, and I suppose it is less labour-intensive, but I do intend to set up a clothesline one of these days and use it as much as possible - they are also great for airing things out and can reduce/kill dust mites in things a bit. On the downside, the uv can fade your clothes. In Australia especially, where it's very strong - I always dried stuff inside out.

Setting the table is the best part of entertaining for me. I love using my beautiful things, and I love washing them and putting them away again, and washing and ironing the linens. (Yes, I hate ironing shirts as much as the next person, but ironing linens keeps me in touch with where they came from- my mother, my grandmother, my MIL, wedding gifts, and even tag sale linens!) I love using my sterling, which my mother picked out for me when I was a baby, and my grandmother's Haviland and cut glass. I love fresh flowers and candles on the table. In fact, I love using the dining room, and if it's more than the 2 of us, I do. We moved last year and the dining room in the new house is easier to use than in our previous house, and I'm happy it gets so much use. I don't always use my good china for everyday dinners in the DR, but I always use my sterling. When my boys were small, I taught them the correct way to set a table, and we always used placemats and cloth napkins, even in the breakfast room. My daughter-in-law is beyond casual - no placemats or tablecloth, sometimes you have to ask for a napkin, bread in a plastic wrapper, etc. My GD, her daughter, is only 2, but she refers to my china and crystal as "Su-su's pretties". I tell her, "Play your cards right and this can all be yours." I gave her an infant feeding spoon in my pattern when she was born as well as a sterling baby cup and a small spoon and fork in my pattern. I am pleased to see that my DIL lets her use them often. I am going to give my DIL (among other things) some pretty washable placemats and cloth napkins (no-iron). Small steps.

Lynn we are in a very similar place about our house - it's too big for us at this stage of our lives. We use most of the square footage in some way - because it's there - but could easily manage with half ! Our youngest will be graduating from college next May and HOPEFULLY will be employed and able to support himself but who knows? Our older son works for the forest service but those gov't jobs are shakey, to say the least, so we always want to have a place where they can land if needed. So.... we keep the big old house - for now. Stuff? I reached a saturation point many years ago and continually work to pare down. But it's back to that big house thing again - I'm not going to live in empty rooms so there's still far more STUFF than I actually need. When my mom died and I helped my dad move into an apartment, tons of family stuff came my way. Eleven years later when my dad died, the rest of it came to me. We've all talked about this before - the pull of family items and how hard it is to get rid of some things. But it has to be done so over the years I've pared down to the things that have the most meaning and passed the rest on in one way or another. I have dreams (nightmares?) about moving into a small home and having boxes and furniture stacked everywhere because I didn't sort and get rid of enough before moving!! Gifts? I could write a book. Christmas at my in-laws used to make me physically ill with the insane buying and giving of cr@p. It doesn't matter to me a bit how much time is put into the shopping and wrapping, or what the item is. When someone (namely my MIL) is purchasing *stuff* because of a date on a calendar and is obsessed with getting the same # of packages for each person, because that's "just what you do for Xmas" I want no part of it. We'd been married only a short time when I told my DH that I was opting out. He was totally on board. It was a sore spot with everyone in his family for many years but we held firm. We just stopped buying. Our kids would get everything they needed and some of what they wanted all through the year at a time when it made sense to get the item, not an enormous pile o' stuff, all on one day, much of it to be returned, exchanged or donated. And that returning/exchanging all fell to me, of course. A few years of that and we started just donating everything, in the boxes, tags still on. Give me a quiet day, with my family cooking together, laughing and going for a long walk...... THAT'S the gift I want.