Hi Cathy, I'm so sorry! I wrote a reply to this post days ago, but I must have forgotten to press "submit," because I just noticed there are no replies. I had a few suggestions, so let's see if I can remember them, haha!

What is the width you need? Would you consider doors rather than a slider? I notice you have a header, but I have seen doors that come w/o a header; not sure if sliders would. I also wondered if it might be possible to add tiling to the top of the shower wall so that you could get the taller height w/o making it look like it extends beyond the height of the shower wall?

Thanks for clarifying on the window--I thought it was a little odd that you had a window with mini blinds in your shower! :-) And I love your bench!

Have a great day! :-)

You always do! :-) I read a cleaning today that might possibly help, although "The Works" sounds amazing and I'm going to Ye Olde Dollar Store next outing. The tip that I read on Amazon customer comments, was regarding a glass bowl sink in a bathroom where a commenter had complained about constant hard water spots on her beautiful new glass bowl sink. The guy who responded said he used that stuff you spray on your car windshield that helps the rain run off faster. He uses it on his glass bowl sink and said it's like magic. When he turns the faucet off, the sink is not wet. All the water just slides down the drain and there are no remaining drops to cause hard water marks in the first place. Thought I'd pass that along, in case you wanted to try it on your shower doors. I'm thinking of trying it on my exterior windows to see if it eliminates, or at least cuts down on, hard water streaks and spots.

Have a fabulous day!

OMG, DebbieB, That's RainX, and we actually have some on hand. I never thought of using it on the shower doors, though. What a great idea! We have just been using a squeegee on them after every shower, which works pretty well. RainX was invented to be used on the cockpit windows of airplanes so the pilots can see in the rain. No wipers at over 200mph...

Here I am, in the middle of spring/pesach cleaning, and my dustpan broke yesterday. The allegedly rubber, but apparently plastic edge strip just fell off, leaving a lip high enough to keep dirt and dust from being swept in.

Well. Friday we went out and bought a water softener. We will be installing it in the pantry. It's more than big enough, it's a huge walk-in about 4 feet wide and 10 feet long. It will block access to a bit of shelving, but that is a small price to pay for getting soft water. Next we need to buy 200 pounds of salt, or 5 of those 40 pound bags. That's how much it holds. I will be calling the MH guy tomorrow to try to get a date set.

The guy is here to do the shelf removal and plumbing part of the water softener installation. I really like this guy's work. He does things the better way, not the easiest way. Tomorrow the electrician comes. Then, I am unsure when, the main guy returns to re-install the shortened shelving and put in a support pole or bracket. But that means that I should have soft water tomorrow - we bought salt yesterday.

Thought I would update this. My soft water ROCKS. I no longer have to use special additives in my dishwasher to get the dishes clean, e.g. Lemi-Shine. My water does not taste salty, it tastes just fine. I had to crank the setting on the water softener up to 30 grains of hardness to get rid of the calcium rings in the bottom of a glass, but once I did that everything has been lovely. Even my clothes are getting cleaner without added Borax to soften the water, and rinsing better, too. Color me happy, indeed.

Hi Cathy! Nice to "see" you! I'm back on the grid and feeling well.

What an adventure you've been having! The water softener sounds amazing and I'm insanely jealous, haha! My dishes, cookware, sinks, and clothes look HORRIBLE since I've moved here. Spots on everything. I'm going to have to live with it for a while, though.

My dishwasher is on its last leg, though. I have to wash my dishes by hand before I put them in the dishwasher, because it gets nothing off of them. The only reason I even bother is because the water gets much hotter than I can get out of the faucet, so I feel like they're at least getting sanitized.

Did you end up getting the combo washer/dryer? If so, how do you like it? I've heard very good things about them. True about the high cost, though.

Nope. Nobody wanted to buy my existing washer and dryer, so i put the water softener in the pantry. Someday, when this washer dryer set dies, I'll get one of those super efficient combo units.