dryer balls and re-usable dryer sheets

Kim Huse wrote:

ANYONE  got a tried and true way to help with the pet hair issue?

I wear regular old yellow rubber kitchen gloves (even ones with holes in them) to wipe pet hair from furniture, carpet, and clothing, rather than using those roller sheets.  The hair just balls up on the textured part of the glove palm,  This method is probably not going to remove every hair before you do laundry, but it might reduce the load of pet hair for your washer and dryer.

I am extremely grateful for my dryer this summer, and usually all winter as well; we live in Mississippi (one of the dampest States) and this summer has been a record-breaker for rain, now with major flooding.  Historically, the summers here are hot and humid with many short thunderstorms and some drought; then it is a long wet, from beginning January to April or so...but the Climate Change People say we are becoming Sub Tropical; maybe that explains all the summer rain.  We literally have mushrooms everywhere, and when I come into the house from outside I smell...Mold

All this to say, in the past when folks had those big woodstoves, I believe they could rig up drying racks etc indoors, when the weather was too wet.  They were generally canning, preserving, etc all summer long and of course one doesn't let the woodstove go cold, when there is always the next meal to get plus baking.  So PERHAPS (unless deep water canning, with all that steam!) they would have had a drier indoors because of the woodstove, and been able to dry clothes in the kitchen.  In the Olden Days, because of the heat, the kitchen was always off at the end of its own wing, or completely detatched from the main house.. Then we got Modern.  I DO have a dual-fuel Autocrat gas/wood stove, but it's small and so is my kitchen.  All that steam and the intense heat would turn it into a sauna.

My point: we do not always know how old-timey folks dealt with things like long stretches of wet weather, or how they managed; their methods were developed by individuals and now are mainly lost.  You simply cannot put off washing for months at a time.

So I'm glad for our dryer.  We also have the large size Lehman's folding drying rack.

Kim Huse wrote:

I have a dog and 2 cats that SHED, SHED , SHED...
ANYONE  got a tried and true way to help with the pet hair issue?

The only thing that ever worked/works is taking cats/dog to a groomer and have their fur/hair shaved.
Over the past years, we took our dogs 3 times a year for a 1/2" body shave  (Spring, Summer, Fall), and now , also our (indoor) cat same time table for 1/4" shave.
No fur and ho hair
I'm attaching pictures before and after of our kitty so you can see

This thread started as a discussion of how to make using a clothes drier more efficient, so my only contribution is use a front end loader.  I noticed a huge difference in drying times when we switched.  This would also help drying time on the line as well.

I'm asking for how folks best utilize the dryer balls.

How many do you put in for a normal load? Does utilizing more reduce more static?

I'm having a heck of a time this winter with static and I'm unsure if perhaps the wool dryer balls I have are deteriorated or if I simply need more.

I have 6 they usually do trick, if people leave them in the dryer.  That's really the only problem I have with them. I don't have any right now. The balls get wound up in the clothes, and my kids "forget to put them back". This is why I wouldn't have a clue what a too old dryer ball looks like.

My 3 dryer balls disappear too. The tennis balls I used to use started to split apart, so I ditched them.

What I really want, if I ever have the right kind of house, is a drying closet. There was an appliance sold for this, but what I really want in the old-fashioned, New England idea of a closet up in the tippy top of a house, with a method for hanging the wet stuff. It probably doesn't work with really sopping clothes (And why would any sane person want to CARRY wet clothes up multiple floors?)

Of course, I'm "crazy,"  I also want a California closet and it took real will power NOT to buy a tin window "winter fridge" at an antique shop. If the dealer hadn't wanted > $100 for it, I would have bought it anyway.