Tips to cut down on laundry drying time

My electricity bill has been going through the roof lately. I am trying to get kids to make sure radios, lights and tv are off when they are not in the room.

Cutting down on using the dryer is what I am working on as well-here are some tips on how to reduce drying time.

Place a clean, dry towel in with the wet load. The dry towel will help absorb moisture cutting down the drying time needed by as much as 25%.

Include a few tennis balls in each dryer cycle. The
tennis balls not only cut drying time by 25% - 50%, but also
fluff the clothes to a delicate softness.

For heavy items such as jeans and towels, put them through an additional "spin" cycle after your wash is done. Heavier items retain water even after a regular spin cycle and an additional spin cycle will cut down on their drying time.

We made the switch to fluorescent light bulbs.

We were doing it gradually, buying one pack at a time every month. Well I decided to do it all the way yesterday- even decorative ones for the ceiling fans and three-way ones for our living room lamps. No more regular light bulb buying for us! I have to say they take a little getting used to. When you first flick them on they are a little dim, then slowly get brighter. We should start hopefully seeing our electric bill go down a bit!

I am keep the receipts because they have a 5 year warranty on them!

For more tips on fluorescent light bulbs

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=cfls.pr_cfls_shapes

Hanging solar lamps for outside

Elisha wanted to share a frugal idea on the Solar Lamps! I haven't seen these at my local hardware store, but hopefully they are available in your area!

There was a recent tip in the Dollar Stretcher newsletter about using a
solar yard lamp during a thunderstorm. I can take that one step further.

When I lived with two roommates, we had little extra spending money. We
were always looking for ways to save a buck or two. Electricity was one
area where we thought we had done enough, but we were wrong!

During a trip to a local hardware store to pick up some nails, we
noticed that there were TWO types of solar yard lamps available- fixed
(on a spike or stake), or hanging (from a hook, sometimes connected to a
stake). We saw that it was only $20 for a three-pack of solar lamps
(I've since seen four packs for the same price, on sale). We bought two
packs of them and six of those pretty plant hangers that people
sometimes use for their hanging plants (the ones that look like pretty
shelf brackets, but with hooks).

When we got home, we mounted the plant hangers over or next to four
windows in our house & put the solar lamps on them. Then, we hung the
other two on the house, next to the front and back doors. In the late
afternoon or early evening, we would open up the blinds to allow the
sunlight to "charge" the indoor lights. The outdoor lights took care of
themselves. At night, we had free household lighting that would last
until sunrise if we'd charged them long enough! We kept a piece of nice
material in rooms that we needed to sleep in, in order to cover the
lights when it was time to go to sleep.

The day after we started doing this, we had a neighbor call us to let us
know that we'd left both our porch lights on overnight. We asked if it
had disturbed her.

"No," she said, "I was just worried about your electric bill. Actually,
I felt safer when I came home from work and they were on, because I
could see to put my key into the lock!"
"Well," said my roommate, "You'll feel safer EVERY night then, because
we're leaving them on from now on- in fact, we CAN'T turn them off!
They're SOLAR lamps & the power is FREE!"


I hope that this tip is useful to all of you & to your readers.

Thanks,
Elisha