Thanks everyone for the feedback, and thank you Marshall for the freezing tip. Chris, I shred the newspaper with scissors into long 1/2 inch strips and add it to the top of the bed.I try to fluff it up a bit so it doesn't mat together too much I add it dry and it absorbs some of the moisture in the bed. As I understand it: . "A balance between "green matter" such as kitchen scraps and "brown matter" such as shredded newspaper for bedding must be maintained in order for the worms to do their work. This is often called "carbon to nitrogen ratio", and should be approximately 30:1 (C:N)" Just like the vegie waste, after a while the paper is completely "digested" and becomes part of the castings. I sometimes I also put in cardboard egg cartons and paper towels that have been used for wiping up things in the kitchen ( but not if there is any soap or such on them ).

su, yes they are LG's. Can't tell you about them yet, haven't used them. We aren't moved in yet. I have Sears Kenmore front loaders at this house and I will never go back to a top loader. Yes, they can get a musty smell if you leave the clothes, but as soon as you put them in the dryer, the smell disapates. It's important to leave the washer door open between washings so it can dry out properly. I've found using Persil laundry detergent is the best. It's a detergent from Germany and the people who buy the German made machines get a sample or box with their machine. That's how I learned about it. I have to get it online, but some appliance stores do carry it. It's more expensive than store bought detergent but the benefits are worth the cost as far as I'm concerned. I don't have to use any bleach in any of my clothes, even my whites. I do animal rescue work and the outside cats can really stink up their bedding when some "mark" others. Anyway, cat urine is the most difficult smell to get out of anything and especially fabric. With the Persil I don't need bleach or anything else to have all their bedding come out clean and fresh smelling. It's amzing. I love not having 3 different detergents and 4 or 5 different additives to "boost" my detergent and my favorite thing is that I don't need to use chlorine bleach anymore. Hate that stuff. Of course now I wash all my whites and the animal's linens in hot water, so that makes a difference also. As far as long cycles on the front loaders, that's only if you want a long cycle. I have 10 different cycles, and some are only 10 minutes long. So you set it for the cycle you want. Plenty of flexibility there. I also rinse all my laundry with vinegar in the rinse. Takes any soap that is in the fabric, out and softens all the clothes, leaving them smelling fresh and clean. I'll be taking my Kenmore pair to put in the garage to wash all the animal bedding and won't have to put it in my new LG machine.

Here is the latest installment of Daughter-san's travel-food blog. I must remonstrate with her to address the dwindling food content. https://katemakesthings.wordpress.com She cooked mussels in Marseille for the first time, and later asked me what interesting things can you do with this shellfish. I didn't know, since my main goal with mussels is to inhale them in great quantity and not let anyone else get any. Any suggestions, you might post on her blog, as we'll be in Marseille for Christmas and could try them. Okay, I'm starting to cook. SWMBO has made two pies and cleaned the house. I have to make a red wine-shallot-balsamic-mushroom reduction, roast a leg of lamb, make a honey glaze and do the ham, then make brussel sprouts with candied walnuts, those are my only jobs for the day. Hopefully I do them well, because SWMBO has been very upset with me. I have been buried in a neighborhood activism project. We are trying to get my neighborhood, Laurelhurst in Portland, listed as a Historic District. I have been writing a website, preparing flyers, setting up an online petition, building a database of houses and neighbors, linking that to an online map to track supporters and opponents, organizing teams of volunteers to canvass door-to-door around their homes, preparing lists of houses to contact and to avoid, beginning fundraising, and generally working a 30 hour/week unpaid job on top of my day job. Which is why I'm not posting so much here, and if you listen to SWMBO - and I would encourage that you don't - completely failing to pull my weight around the house. I've decided that there's been enough sitting around and bemoaning things without doing anything to change them. At all levels, from national to local. I've been encouraging all my friends to pick a cause and get to work.

lazy_gardens - Thank you for the gimp suggestion. I downloaded it and was able to improve on the distortion. I'd googled solutions and Lightroom came up, but I'm not ready to commit to the monthly subscription fee (yet) (My brother is a timber framer who photographs his (so beautiful) work. He shoots RAW plus black and white for all pictures - his tip - and uses Lightroom). I have my first DSLR - Canon Rebel T6i - love it!! - with a 18-135 lens. A great deal of the fun to me of working on projects is photographing them. I'm watching videos and experimenting. Annkh - Neat!! That must be a beautiful feeling (money in the bank, firewood stacked) to see everything neatly lined up. Do you eat all you can? (hee hee) artemis_ma - If he takes forever and does a wonderful job, you'll be pleased (as long as you can afford!). I can provide a sketch-up, but a lot of it is undocumented - ex: how to secure the top edge to the ceiling and what to do when surfaces are not level. I'm sure he would come up with better ways to do this, given time to think it through. Notching the shelves took 12-16 cuts, per shelf. MaWizz - here's a link to some photobucket pictures of our reveal. Use your mouse track wheel to scroll through. Details can be found here. Or you can google bold tile and we pop up on the first page (or are those just my search results...?!)