The Smell of Sunshine

So where were we?

Oh yes - holes in the ground. Digging to China.

So the holes have been dug, the heavy duty cardboard tube has been placed in the ground, rocks for drainage have been put in place, the metal post has been put in place (at just the proper angle), and the concrete has been mixed, poured and cured. Phew.

Sealer was then applied to the dried cement, and then the two-part metal clothes line was erected. Screws are now holding it in place. This baby doesn't wiggle at all!!! And then the lines were strung through the eye-screws.

And now we have clothes hanging on the line. All this work, and why? The Lovey likes the scratchy feel of towels right off the line (well, who doesn't?). Me - I love just about everything about line dried clothes. The process, the feeling, the idea of using the sun's energy instead of electricity to dry my clothes. But the best part is the smell! Ah, that smell of sunshine. You can't put that in a bottle.

… and then we dug to China

When I was a kid, I spent my summers at my grandparents house. I have memories of HOT days, cool nights, walking barefoot, eating apricots right off the tree, listening to the train whistling in the distance at night - and oh, so much more. I didn't have many friends in Modesto and I spent my days alone, making mud pies and digging to China -  digging holes under the apricot tree. My love for playing in the dirt started early.

Me, picking apricots

Fast forward to the present. Last year we relocated our chicken coop and yard from our back yard to it's current home on our side yard. In order to do that we had to take down our clothes line. That line has been sorely missed.

The original Dig to China Spoon

After a year of nagging (Me? Nag? You bet!), we finally began the process of putting that line back in.
First we had to dig two holes - one for each pole - and prep the hole for concrete. This is not a job for the official Dig to China Spoon, so we broke out our sturdy power tool, the post hole digger.

After the hole was dug, we had to widen it ever so slightly for it to be the correct size for the cardboard tube. We got one 8-foot tube that we then cut into two four feet tube. Each tube went ALL THE WAY into the ground. Which meant that we had to dig over four feet down. Yes folks, that's pretty close to China.

We had several supervisors and critics, yet The Lovey and his engineer mind was his own worst critic as usual. I think we did a fabulous job making these holes and setting the poles. The clothesline is that much closer to a reality! YAY!!!