The Ojai Post

WONDERFUL!

Best green thing I've seen all week!!

I never knew the clothesline went out of style. The UV rays kill germs, the sun bleaches out stains and the clothes smell fresh unlike a dryer. Drawback-you have to iron the clothes. How much energy does that take?

Ha! Ha!

Some big city kids came to visit me with their dad and saw my old wooden clothes rack.

The ten-year old asks, "Daddy, what's that?"

The dad explains that it is illegal to hang out clothes to dry at their condo. You get in trouble even for hanging out wet towels and bathing suits!!

A good project for the Ojai Valley Green Coalition and Ojai City Council would be to be sure it is not illegal to hang out clothes in any apartment or condo complex in Ojai.

Last time I checked, the OVGC flyer on reducing energy consumption still had one thing missing that is glaring in a hot place like Ojai:
Use a clothesline instead of a dryer!

As the video pointed out, it is a national movement among eco-conscious people to bring back the old-fashioned clothesline.

The clothesline is one of the best energy efficient appliances you can use in the home.

Stopglobalwarming.org reports line drying your clothes in the spring and summer can prevent an estimated 700lbs of carbon dioxide (per household) from releasing into the atmosphere.

The standard clothes dryer consumes an estimated 900kWh of energy per year, about 10% of a household’s total energy consumption.

The clothes’ dryer is the second largest consumer of household energy after the refrigerator.

Check out "Project Laundry List" on facebook. Perfect for Ojai!

"The UV rays kill germs, the sun bleaches out stains and the clothes smell fresh unlike a dryer."

Good point Emerald!

i've extolled the virtues of line-drying on this very blog before (HERE), and continue to dry Noa's cloth diapers this way when the weather is nice. TODAY is a great day for line-drying, and you can see how i've done it HERE.

evan, somehow i missed your article the first time you posted it so it was nice to have a chance to read it...great photo of the diapers drying, Bernadette would like it...

wish i had thought to take photos of laundry hanging out to dry in Holland. It rains so much that they even have special clothes lines in the bedroom close to the ceiling (since heat rises).

Works great if you don't mind sleeping under hanging laundry.

In Indonesia seems like there was miles and miles of laundry hanging out to dry everywhere...

Hey! Ojai had a Day Without a (plastic or paper) Bag. This summer when it's 104 degrees we can have a Day Without a Dryer!

My mother never had a dryer. On rainy days she had clotheslines strung in the basement of our house in SoPas, she had a wooden clothes rack in the kitchen for less than sunny days and then lines in the backyard for sunny days. She did the laundry for a family of six just fine that way. I've had a clothesline my whole adult life. It has been in a place where the neighbors can't see it. On rainy days I hang clothes on hangers on the towel rack over the heating vent in the bathroom.

thanks for that sharing, Emerald! what comes to mind immediately is "where there's a will, there's a way."

a philosophy that's sorely lacking in so many areas of concern today...

in the countryside in Japan, besides hanging our clothes to dry ... every couple of days, when it is sunny, we throw our bedding ... blankets, sheets, futons ... out on the roof for air and sun.

turn them over after an hour ... and bring them in an hour later.

all the bedding, as well as clothes, smell of Grandmother Sun ...

and we sleep in her warm embrace!

Well, if Emerald can brag about his wonderful mother, I can too!

My 88-year old Dutch-Indonesian parents never had a dryer either. If you go visit them at 1042 Fairview I guarantee you will see their clothes, sheets and towels drying in the sun. My dad hangs his shirts on a hanger in such a way that there are very few wrinkles.

My sisters and I were laughing our heads off the other day because we noticed our mom uses one of her walkers for drying socks and underwear. She drapes the wet socks and undies (often hand-washed)over the metal bars and positions the walker where there is the most sun!

Millennium,

That is such a beautiful image,

"sleeping in the warm embrace of Grandmother Sun..."

I place the line dryed clothes in the dryer for a few mintues to get the wrinkles out so that I don't have to use the iron.