Roll Over

Every since we moved into the new house Erin has been getting a lot more junk mail. And a different kind of junk mail. When we rented, Erin would get tons of applications for credit cards. She used to take everything out of the envelope, write in black sharpie "Please take me off your mailing list. Thanks, Erin" on the order form, then she shoved everything (including the original envelop) into the prepaid return envelop and dropped it in the mail. Thus, Erin was able to support the Post Office and get her name off the mailing list. Pretty simple, effective, and costly to the junk mailers.

Now Erin is getting a higher class of junk mail. But I would say the most disturbing junk mail that is coming in is all the applications for life insurance. Who knew owning a home was so dangerous? Well, ok I can see why. Higher class junk mail isn't the only new phenomenon of home ownership. I mean, Erin is actually using the fireplace. And if you seen Erin use a fireplace you would know why she is getting so many life insurance applications. (Shhh...don't tell her we are requesting more information to be mailed.)

Anyway, let's get to the point...if there is any. Erin is not sending the junk mail back. Instead she is hoarding all her newspapers and junk mail to use for kindling for her fireplace for next winter. Which means we are starting to get closets full of junk mail.

So to help out with the clutter, I decided to make Erin some newspaper (and junk mail) logs. First I went to the internet to investigate how you should go about making a newspaper log. And I found all these "log rollers" which were super expensive. Not to mention super worthless (or so the reviews said). And then I came across a nice simple instruction video on how to make CHEAP paper logs. And as a extra added bonus, to relieve some stress. So I gathered the supplies and the troops and we were off.

I put Chris in charge of organizing and wetting the papers. I figured with Chris being the oldest should have some good organizational skills that could be put to work. Unfortunately, Chris wanted to read all the junk mail before passing it into the tub.

Ooo..half off toilet paper and pizza!

Once the papers were all wet I got to beat them with a hammer and then roll them on a pipe. I got this job because I have all the muscles of the group. And because I don't trust D.J. with a hammer nor a metal pipe.

Squishy

Once I removed the the log from the pipe I moved it to the drying rack with D.J. (Don't tell Erin I used her cookie drying racks for this.) D.J.'s job was to make sure the logs stayed on the rack to dry. Basically, D.J. kept trying to crawl into the water tub and splash around. So I was hoping I could keep the little sheep on the rack to dry off so that I didn't get yelled at by Erin for bring a wet sheep into the house.

Stay...Stay!

Overall, I think we had a pretty good assemble line going on. Henry Ford would be proud.

Look, no bottle neck!

And when it was all said and done we had 10 logs.

Burn, baby Burn!

Ok, Erin did comment that it took us all day and that it might not have been as efficient as originally hoped. We did only produce one log every hour. But when you consider all the union breaks we had to work in, I thought we did a good job. And we still were able to sleep, watch movies, play on the net, and all the other fun stuff we do on a Saturday at home. I even think Erin washed the dishes.

Now all we have to do is wait for the logs to dry and Winter to come to try it out. Stay tune!