I woke up this morning thinking, "I'll wash the slip cover on the futon today" It's been a long time and the cover sorely needed it. All went well until I pulled it out of the dryer, "huh, still wet." So I checked the lint trap, sure enough, full, but not your average nicely compacted sheet of well organized lint, no. I had loose fuzzy lint that was still stuck down in the chute.

I thought about using a metal coat hanger but didn't want to go through the trouble of bending one. So in a stroke of genius I thought, rubber spatula! Perfect right? Bendable, and most importantly gave me more reach. All went well until that darn thing slipped right outta my hand, and I heard it hit the bottom of the lint trap! "can I reach it?" I wondered as I stuck my arm as far as it would go, no such luck.

In a brief moment of panic I thought, "I'll call the landlord" and then imagined my embarrassment as I explained how the kitchen utensil ended up in the dryer lint trap. Nope. That wasn't an option. Next option, take the thing apart myself. "Well what's the harm in taking the cover off to see how hard it would be?"

I went on a hunt for tools. Unfortunately my Husband likes to keep his tools in the car, I thought about the nut driver set I got him for Christmas one year, and how perfect it would be. But it wasn't to be, and this was all I had...


I pulled out the dryer, and was slightly embarrassed by the mess behind it...but in the nature of journalism, and fair and balanced reporting here's what I faced-


By a sheer miracle I found the right size socket and started. For my first trick I took off the back panel, okay not so bad-


Now, the spatula had to be in the black chute on the left...but how to get it off? Ah more screws. Okay what's four more? After those came out I still couldn't get the chute off. Here's why-


Anchored at the top. So with that done, I was victorious! I could see the spatula!




The offending tool!


I took the opportunity to dig out all the lint, and sand (!) that had collected in the chute, it was pretty amazing! All clean!



And sure enough, back together and working wonderfully!



I took all the pics as proof! I can't wait for David to see this post when he gets home! So even though my pride won out, and I'm very smug in the fact that I won't be the fodder for one of those "You can't guess what the lady tried to clean the lint trap with!" stories. I don't mind sharing this story because I learned how to dismantle the dryer all by myself, and probably saved a ton of money by not calling a repairman! Huzzah!

Here are some pics of the place we stayed in Lake George NY.

The weather was a very nice 17 degrees our first day, -2 overnight. But it was a "dry" cold so it was good. Somehow I remember it feeling a lot colder when I was younger


Dave especially loved the big screen TV above the fireplace, and we arrived on Superbowl Sunday, so that was a bonus!


I loved the kitchen!


The bed was huge!!




It was a struggle every morning to drag ourselves out of this most comfortable bed!! The view made it even more wonderful.




We spent the majority of the week just hanging around and relaxing. We did go to Plattsburg on Tuesday to see my family. On Thursday we went tubing at West Mountain, and Saturday we went to the Saranac Lake Winter Carnival. The Theme this year was "Pirates of the Adirondacks".





They even made a pirate ship to match the theme! Unfortunately our photos didn't come out very well

This is our first official entry in our first official blog! This is just a post to say hello and announce our presence to the online world. I'll be updating shortly with wedding and vacation photos!!