Saturday, August 13, 2011

Giveaway Time

Lately the nights and mornings have been very chilly which makes that the house is the perfect temperature to feel like curling up on a comfortable chair with a cozy blanket and a good book. And while I can't give you the chair or the blanket I do have a good book here that is waiting to find a home with someone who would enjoy reading it.

Simon & Susie Stories by David Wagler is a book that covers three and a half years of a typical Amish teen during their "rumspringa"   It is another one of the books that I used to really like while I was growing up.

If you would like to have a chance to win it leave a comment telling me what the strangest thing was you ever found in your washing machine. I have had a fair share of unintended things appearing in the washer. Anything from spare change, pens, to the dreaded paper towel but by far the strangest and most unsettling for me was the day I discovered a little toad bravely bobbing on the top of the clothes. Needless to say the toad was removed and the clothes were washed again.

For a second entry leave a link on your blog for this giveaway and come back and leave another comment telling me you did.

I will be drawing a winner on Monday afternoon, August 15th using random generator.
Disclaimer: The only compensation I get from doing this giveaway is the warm fuzzy feeling I get from knowing someone else will get to enjoy this book.

56 comments:

  1. I, too, have had many funny things in the washer. During hunting season, bullets have been found. During a building project long nails, once I found a $20 bill, which I did return to my husband :)
    From the children came all the usual crayons, rocks, sticks, and other treasures.

    Lots of surprises!
    blessings,
    Niki

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  2. A. Dead. Mouse.

    please enter me :)

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  3. I've had a lot of strange things too, but the most recent find in the laundry was a bunch of white gel stuff. It had covered everything in the wash. After closer inspection, I found the cause....a diaper that Miss Pearl (my granddaughter) had put in the hamper and I hadn't noticed it when I threw the wash in.

    Thankfully, it was a new one! I had to take everything outside and shake it off then rewash it all.

    Who knew that diapers had all that white stuff in them? LOL

    I would love to read this book. Thanks for the chance.

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  4. I have had chapstick go through my wash, often! What is strange, though, is when it doesn't stain the clothes!!! :)


    thecountryblossom at hotmail dot com

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  5. Hi, I found a ziplock bag that must have fallen in from the shelf above. lol, It was very clean... maybe I should wash them all like that! lol
    Thanks for the generous giveaway.
    Michelle

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  6. A crawdad. No joke. My dad had gotten some to use as bait for fishing and one got out of the bucket and made its way across the basement floor into the washer. It was covered with dust and looked like something out of a horror movie.

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  7. The book sounds interesting.
    I've found a lot of stuff in my washer including $20 bill (love that), sandwich bag and the dreaded kleenex tissue in a million pieces.

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  8. I've found an unopened vial of Oscillocossilum completely in tact without any water in it after washing clothes. We had gone through a time of sickness here and I guess the children felt the need to carry it in their pocket. :)

    I'd like to be entered in your drawing as well. :)

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  9. I have found many strange things in the washer after almost 40 years of marriage, but I would have to say the strangest was a lizard! We lived in Okinawa at the time and they were everywhere. I enjoy you blog so much. It is the one that I check everyday for a new posting and look forward to the next.

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  10. Strangest thing I have ever found would have been our kitten Inky. Luckily did not add clothes or water before I noticed him. he loved sleeping in cozy out of the way spots, like the washer & dryer. Broke him from it by keeping dryer door open, holding in button and having son turn it on.

    My blog: http://kqsue.blogspot.com

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  11. Years ago when my washer was on the back porch there was a snake in it.
    It took me years to get over it. The thing I like the most is dollar bills.

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  12. Just recently I found $50 in my wash!!! It came out of my jean skirt pocket! I placed it there because I was in too big of a hurry to put it away where it belonged.

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  13. I left a comment on my blog:

    chilsonchitchat.blogspot.com

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  14. well, I've found pocket change, markers (with the caps on) crayons, pebbles, a feather, pens, a pencil and minature golf score card, and the most unuaual....a dead cricket. Hmmmm, I'm thinking I need to do a better job checking pockets. :) With the hubby and all boys, who knows what I'll find! LOL

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  15. My mom once found one of my dad's half-finished cigars bobbing merrily in the washing machine. Small, black, and oblong, it looked an awful lot like - well, something out of a chamber pot!

    The strangest thing I have found was a black snake. I had a stone basement in my first home, and one hot August day the meter man came upstairs, looking dazed, to tell me there was a snake in the washing machine. I asked him to help me while I put it out. He, brave manly creature, wouldn't touch it. I've always lived in the country and knew it wasn't harmful, so I just grasped it gently by the back of the neck and lifted it up. He held open the window.

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  16. Not sure I've ever found anything stranger than the classic crayon. I've certainly found things I liked better though, like the money.

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  17. I've found a pack of gum as well as a tube of chapstick in the bottom of the washer! I've never found a toad, though, thank goodness! I'm glad he made it out okay. lol

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  18. My husband and I were traveling across the country and stopped to clean clothes in a laundromat. Taking the clothes out of the washer, I noticed orange marks all over them. Inspecting the marks closer, they appeared to not only be a stain but also stuck on really well. I was getting a little upset, since we only had those clothes to wear for the rest of our trip. Then a fellow in the laundromat, overhearing our conversation, came over to tell us that the orange was from markers the miners in the area used, and that the person using the machine before us must have left one in a pocket. He told us that the color would fade - eventually.

    In my own washer, I would say that finding my son's wallet would be my biggest surprise. I think I check pockets pretty well (even though they are supposed to be checked by the wearer before they are placed in the hamper!), but one day his wallet came out of the wash. The wallet and everything inside were very wet but, fortunately, all dried out and was OK in the end. It could have been worse - my aunt found my nephew's cell phone in the wash, and that was ruined. And apparently it was a pretty expensive phone.

    I would NOT like to find frogs or snakes in the machine!! My mother-in-law told me that my husband used to collect various little wild things like worms and frogs while outside playing and put them into his pockets - often forgetting to take them out later. I guess she didn't check pockets too carefully, because she said she often found the critters later, having perished during the laundry cycle. :-(

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  19. I have found crayons and candy that my kids left in their pockets. I've found jewelry, including a pin that my daughter gave me. I had accidently left it pinned to a blouse. I was crushed when I found it in the washer because it was ruined. I washed a pair of my sunglasses clip-ons recently. Thankfully, they're still useable. I've found disposable gloves from work and tissues left in pockets. Of course, the washer shreds the tissues and they get all over everything. I wish I weren't so absent-minded, but if I weren't life would be more boring. LOL

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  20. It would have to be my cell phone that I had put in the secert pocket of my runabout winter coat.
    washer 1...phone 0
    Had to go out and buy a new one.:(

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  21. I've never found snakes or lizards. I have found money. And one time I washed a cell phone. Amazingly it stayed in the pocket while it was washed and I didn't actually "find" it until it had been washed AND dried (yes in the dryer). Needless to say it didn't make it :p

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  22. I don't know about strange but I have washed my husband's lighter, pencils, matches, reading glasses, receipts (required another washing to get most of the paper out of the clothes) but my best find has been a hundred dollar bill that he left in his pocket and of course all money found in washer belongs to me.

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  23. My husband's cell phone. Oops!

    Then there's the usual....bills of various denominations, coins, oodles of chapstick every winter, a lighter, ("no, mom--I promise it's not mine"), and a plastic cereal bowl & a spoon. Sigh.

    Great giveaway! Please enter me.

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  24. ball point pen with stains on the laundry. would love of have a copy of your give a away
    Rachel

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  25. Hmmmm, I know I've found crickets in there before, alive and dead (which grosses me out) but I can't think of anything else. Probably after I'm done here I'll think of something!

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  26. Okee dokee, I just posted a link on my blog. :)

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  27. My family and I were planting our first "real" garden in the country. I forgot I put the left over melon seeds in my pocket. We found seeds for a week.

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  28. I can't really remember anything really unusual, but please enter me in your giveaway. I am very fond of books on the Amish and have a large collection that I share with family and friends. Thank you for your enlightening blog.

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  29. I have had many things go in my washer such as my husband's wallet numerous times, a bottle od neon green nail polish that came open ( we had fun trying to remove those spots from clothes), cans of WD 40, money pens, lipstick, are only a few of the things to go through it. Recently I lost my small devotional magazine and as I was looking for it, my husband got the wash out of the washer and said there is white paper bits over everything! Guess I accidently picked it up when I sat down dirty clothes for a second. My husband and I often laugh at what we will find when we open the washer. I'm just so thankful to have a hubby who helps with the wash.

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  30. What a fun question! I've washed a few loads with lip gloss, which resulted in oil spots on t-shirts. I love finding dollar bills, always a nice surprise :-). Sometimes I don't realize soemthing strange was in the wash until I hear it loudly clanging in the dryer. The book sounds interesting -- I looked it up on google and it is out of print. Makes it even more special!

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  31. Oh, this is not a submission for the giveaway because 1) it was my daughter, not me and 2) it was the dishwasher, not clothes that she opened to find that her mechanic/race car building husband had put a portion of his old transmission in there to clean up!!! He spent some time cleaning up the dishwasher afterward!! Thanks for bringing up that memory (and I promise not to bring it up to him again!)

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  32. Every now and again we do have little lizards turn up for a run around the laundry, it's always a nice surprise . . but not so nice the time I found a flattened little lizard in the bottom of the washing machine after I removed towels. Poor little lizard.

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  33. i have found several things in my times of washing clothes from hot wheels to polly pockets and money. But a candy bar is what comes to mind today.

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  34. I don't know if it just that I haven't had enough years of doing laundry yet or my family is good at emptying their pockets so the only things that come to mind are spare change, paper and bobby pins. But I would love to win the book!

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  35. Nothing too strange: the occasional stick of gum, endless shredded kleexex (ugh!), paper towels, panty liners, and one time, when all three kids were still at home, a twenty dollar bill that no one claimed, so it was all mine! :)

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  36. Bullets, after washing my soldier son's clothes.

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  37. How do you do that ... finding these strange things in the washer. I never find anything LOL
    But please, please enter me in the give away because I love reading books that include about the live of the Amish.

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  38. Soybeans. Lots of them, swollen and mashed. My husband was in a grain bin in Carharts and every pocket must have been filled. Im not even sure how I got them in the washer without them spilling everywhere. It was a mess.
    I just finished Ira Waglers book and am quite interested in his Father's writing.

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  39. the strangest thing I found in my washing machine was a toy elephant - that I had never seen before and certainly didn't buy for my son.

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  40. Besides change, I think the strangest thing had to be screws from the machine itself, the spinner mechanism completely disassembled during one spin cycle.

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  41. Strangest thing for me personally would be a favorite wristwatch that's now broken :( I haven't had much expirience doing other people's wash since I'm just 17 so I don't have any strange things to find lol!
    Kate

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  42. bullets, screws, small tools, glasses and money are par for the course around here. but the strangest thing i ever found at tht bottom of my washer was a mouse. it was, of course, dead, and it was totally flattened out and cleaned. the eyes and whiskers were still intact, however....

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  43. A couple of slugs. Ewww! I was trying to grab them with a paper towel (not my bare hands of course!) and they kept trying to get into the holes in the sides. I had to keep putting it on spin cycle and they'd come out, then I'd have to get them before they crawled back in.
    I didn't discover them till I had the whole load of clothes out so I had to go through them and make sure there were no more then re-wash them.

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  44. one of my son's wet diapers...luckily, I hadn't started the washer yet...I have yet to figure out how it got into the laundry hamper instead of the diaper genie, although I strongly suspect my husband had something to do with it...other than that, sockets, nails, screws, hoof picks, change, and sometimes dollar bills....

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  45. a puppy... Our older dog had her puppies in the living room behind a big overstuffed chair.. Every day I would change out the blanket and wash the dirty one. I guess one of the pups had died and when I went to move the blanket from the washer to the dryer I found him. I felt so bad that he had gone through the washer but was grateful he didn't make it into the dryer..

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  46. I have found some dollar bills, change and silver chains.

    Nothing really interesting.

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  47. I am laughing I have found almost everything listed in my washer!! My husbands cell phone was the most expensive oops! I have found money... large and small and the rule is you find it you keep it!! Most unusual was when I had my boat up in Alaska and I found crab claws in the washer...they were in my rain coat pocket and I had not looked!

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  48. Just about everything everyone else has listed except the mouse, the puppy and the slugs. I think the worst was an ink pen because I didn't find it actually IN the washer but after it went through the drier and exploded all over the clothes.

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  49. I posted a link to the give away on my blog.

    www.puddlesofmud.com

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  50. I haven't really found anything weird in the laundry. My husband has a habit of leaving gum in his pockets which I usually don't find tell it's in the dryer. What a mess.

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  51. My husband works at the local hospital and I have found a glove or two after washing his clothes.
    I have also found packages of gum that were in pockets and the washer decided to chew and spit out on clothes. err

    moma3homeschool(at)gmail(dot)com

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  52. Rocks. My beautiful boy used to find rocks for me on the playground and I'd find them in the bottom of the washing machine. You'd think I'd have started to check his pockets... Chipped the porcelain in my washer but I kept EVERY ONE of those rocks. Have a big bucket in the basement.

    He doesn't bring me rocks any more but every now and then he'll ask if I still have them all and he always seems so happy that I have kept them. I love that boy.

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  53. Nothing extremely interesting, although gum was the worst, especially after it went through the dryer and melted all over the clothing. HUGE mess to clean up!

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment. I love hearing your thoughts.