The Clothesline is Up and Running

Well, not running but you know what I mean. It's something I've been thinking about for quite a while. The motivation behind it is to save money on our electric bill by not using the dryer which is harder to do in the winter. Last winter I jerryrigged a clothesline that ran from our living room wall to our dining room wall (through the doorway in between). This method made it difficult to use the house during laundry day. So now the line has moved to the bedroom over the bed-- a place I don't use or walk around in the course of my usual day.

This is one half of the clothesline rig. There is a duplicate on the opposite wall. It's looks the same as the one above the bed so I didn't take a picture of it -- it has nothing to do with needing to tidy the top of my dresser. Being in the bedroom I insisted that it didn't scream 'utilitarian' (I had nightmarish images of a 2x4 with ragged edges and big screw eyes bolted to the wall). I needed it to be pretty so it increases my will to not just live, but do laundry. I wanted it to be something that we would want to take with us when we eventually move. I could see using these in a future mudroom or really anywhere. I like the idea that my home contains only things which I find either useful or beautiful (preferably both)-- of course it's a work in progress.

I also didn't have much to spend-- especially since the goal is to save money. The boards I used Dennis picked up for free-- yay! free! The moulding is the cheap kind and to trim both units cost almost $20 and I still have a fair bit left over and have an idea as to how I may use it for another project. The glue, spackle, and paint we had already.

The knobs I found at a local cabinet hardware shop (on Harrison for those in town). It's a nice little shop where it's not hard to find knobs in the $8 a piece range (and up-- I found one type of little sparkly glass knob for $16 ea. and I didn't ask about anything that wasn't labeled). But they had a little clearance section made up mostly of shiney brass but with some other nice knobs. The ones I purchased were $1.6o each which isn't the cheapest knob but a very good price for this quality and aesthetic-- they were going to be put under significant strain so I needed hefty one piece non-plastic knobs. Similar knobs at Home Depot can be found for $20 per pack of 10 so I was still pretty happy with the ones I found. So in total I spent about $40 for both pretty shelvey clothesline rigs.

This is with my first load of laundry. It takes a couple minutes to set up and it can't handle huge loads (because the room is 9 feet long) but it gets the job done. I just have to make sure I do laundry the first thing in the morning so everything is dry by bed time.

(mostly for Dad) Yes they are screwed into studs, three studs per shelf, two 2 1/2" screws per stud. The shelf tips back toward the wall (not square) and the top run of cove is attached off set of the shelf board creating a small lip-- I think both of these things will adequately prevent things from falling off the shelf (and onto our sleeping heads-- we just won't put cartoon anvils up there). See? functional and pretty!