Wow, Nicole, that bed is a work of art! Contest with your hubby?! No way LOL. You already won! :-) And good that you're putting those welders to such good use! CalamityJ, I have trouble believing there's anything that you can't do at your house from what I've seen of your talent :-) Thanks Karen, I agree with you about Nicole's bed being very high end. SusieRose, if you could ever find an attactive huge container on Freecycle, that would be the way to go with bamboo. There are so many interesting varieties, but it takes over if you don't plant it in its own "island". Really spreads and is hard to get rid of if you decide to dig it up. Trust me on this one! Ugh, I'll never plant it in a mixed garden again! Unless you've got an area just for bamboo, I'd go with a very large container. You might run an an in the Wanted section of Craigslist too maybe. Someone might have some to give you, or barter for a totem maybe :-) DD, my next marriage is gonna be to a carpenter LOL, but a welder with a rig might qualify LOL. Just kiddin' of course. Luckygal, you'll have to share pics with us when your hubby gets around to your welding wish list. I've known lots of northern hillbillies ..... western ones too! LOL When I first got to southern Calif I thought it would be all cool and groovy people, this was the '70's. The first person I saw when we reached the beach and got out of the car was some redneck with his ciggarette pack rolled up in his white tee shirt sleeve! LOL Of course he probably came from somewhere around here lol .... Stoney, I love your natural trellis! I bet it was fun to make! I'm not familiar with bittersweet vines either, but I love how your trellis looks. Vickie, I agree about the movement in Stoney's natural trellis too. So free flowing .... And Clarejoe .... I love the bean trellis you've made! How smart and it looks great too! Very good way to reuse an old two seater frame! I like how it looks "older" too. Adds character. Just for the record, it doesn't have to be a hillbilly trellis, y'all LOL. I love all the trellises. Just thought that one I rigged up on my deck in 2006 was a bit ummmmmm "freestyle" for my historic neighborhood. Maybe they think I'm into witchcraft too LOL (for the newbies, when we did the Junk Train and it came to my house, my son-in-law from Mexico originally, thought I was into some kind of witchcraft hahahahahah) Is that a wart on the end of my nose?! LOL ~tenderlee

I also have hard water and use Charlie's Soap, but the truth is, many detergents/soaps don't work well in hard water now that phosphates have been removed from them. Most detergents recommend using MORE than the normal amount if you have hard water and don't use softeners in the wash and the rinse. Another problem is from using COLD water, along with having hard water. Unless specifically designed to be used in cold water, most detergents don't dissolve properly in cold water. Water Temperature Recommendations: HOT (120-140°F) - white and heavily soiled colorfast items WARM (85-105°F) - most loads COLD (65-75°F) - only for bright colors with light soil Cold water below 65°F is not recommended for washing Note: Detergent manufacturers and care labels define cold water as 80-85°F. I doubt if most of us know what the water temperature is - especially in the winter. If the temperature of water in the tub is too cold for your hands, the detergent will not activate and clean effectively. I often think we get caught up in the cold water/save the planet issue, when water temperature is a BIG factor in detergent performance and cleaning ability, not just the detergent. -Grainlady

O.K., here I go again. I got more nuts thanks to Matt from buy soapnuts@yahoo.com. I must say these nuts looked nice, lighter color, somewhat sticky and I was excited again and so I did one load of laundry,which was clean after. The rest of the nuts I used to make the liquid. I followed instructions and when it was done I ended up w/ this brown liquid. It really didn't feel soapy much at all and it is not sudsing at all either. My question is. Should I feel soapiness when I put it on my hand? Should the liquid be brown? And if I don't feel the soapiness, how do I know that tiny amount of the liquid will really clean our laundry? I really like the idea of something natural but this just doesn't look right to me. Please help me w/ this dilema.

sloneby - It hasn't been my experience that the dispensers have broken. My current dispenser is a multiply-resused/recycled Bath and Body one and I've been using the same one where I've refilled it for over two years now. The one in the bath has been at use longer than that and is used much more than the one in the kitchen. It's been my experience that the soap doesn't separate out at all - it stays and even dilution without a problem. It may be worth noting that I don't use an anti-bac soap with the little beads nor do I use a creamy based liquid to make my dilution. The one I've been using the most often has been Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap (Pure Castile Soap with organic oils). It's avaiable scented or unscented (then you can add your own essential oils if you prefer). I've also used other soaps as well when I was out of Dr. Bronner's and needed to mix up a batch. Every once in a while, I need to rinse off the nozzle if it starts to clog up a bit, but I would say that happens maybe once in between a refill, if even that much. In the meantime, I bought one of these. Unfortunately, it's not satin nickle, but it works okay. I get one that matches the color of the room the best and then just use the sleeve over it. Not perfect, but better. I've been thinking of checking into getting some spray paint to see if I can paint over it in a satin finish. Here is a link that might be useful: Bath & Body cover