I can't stop thinking about mountains of laundry and people who live amongst them. For all you mountain dwellers or anyone who sometimes finds themselves on a little pathway leading towards the great peaks… Here are a few tips to help you MOVE MOUNTAINS! Of Laundry that is.
Set up a Laundry Routine. If you do not have a regular laundry day or it is not part of your daily routine, set this up NOW! I find it easier to wash a load every day as part of my routine. If I do this and keep it up, we never have dirty laundry because I am washing as soon as there is enough for a particular load. I have always been a bit obsessed with laundry. As soon as there is enough for a load I like to wash it right then! When we arrive home from a trip I usually have a load of laundry started before Kenneth is finished paying the taxi driver. These tips apply whether you do the laundry all in one day or as part of your regular daily routine.
Sort into loads. I prefer these four basic categories: Jeans & Darks (cold), Colored (cold) , Whites (hot with oxyclean), and Towels & Sheets (hot with bleach). Sometimes I subdivide them when I have reds, etc. I also subdivide whites, washing delicates separate and hanging them to dry. I use a laundry sorter with 3 sections for clothing items.
Our household routine is that ALL dirty laundry is immediately sorted. Anything with stains is set on top of the washer or over the side of the sorter as a signal that is needs pre-treatment (more about stains in a future blog). Because we live in a damp climate towels are placed in a separate basket in the bathrooms. I also keep a basket in the laundry room for odd things, wet items, or clothes that are extra filthy (from sports, etc.).
Wash as soon as you have a load. At the end of the day when everyone puts their PJ’s and tosses their clothes into the sorter, take note. If there is enough to make a load, start it right then. If your laundry room is near your back door like ours, put things directly into the machine and start it up when you walk in the door.
This works great after sports. Just today Kenneth and Awsumb had baseball practice and they started their wash when they walked in the door (I had previously left a couple things for them to add to their load so it would be a full load). It was switched after dinner and is now ready to fold and put away and ready for the big game on Thursday. Stain removal is also easier when tended to right away.
Start first thing in the morning. After you have showered and dressed for the day gather a load of laundry from your bedroom. For me this is usually sheets or towels. I wash towels almost every day because we live in a damp climate. I like to wash sheets once a week minimum. You many choose to assign a day of the week to each set of bedroom sheets. On your way to the laundry room, gather enough for a full load from the other bedrooms and bathrooms in the house. If you have one laundry day, you can still do this on your off days so that the mountain doesn’t grow out of control. Even if you only follow this rule on your big laundry day, this habit will get you started first thing in the morning so you can actually move that mountain by the end of the day.
But if you are like me and want to do laundry every day this fits nicely into a daily routine. This first load can be forgotten about until lunch or afternoon. At which time it is switched to the dryer. A second load that was gathered later in the day can then be started.
Fold or hang and put away RIGHT THEN! I always plan to have things finish in the dryer when I am ready to deal with them right then. For me this is in the late evening. When you fold or hang laundry directly out of the dryer it will be easier to iron and will fold nicely. There is nothing I love more than clean, warm laundry. I prefer to do this late at night while enjoying a guilty pleasure by watching something recorded on TiVo. I think it is best to iron right away as well, but admit I don’t always do this these days. At least hang the clothes so they are ready to go when you get around to ironing. (more on ironing in a future blog).
By putting your laundry away ASAP this eliminates the second deadly sin of laundry – mountains of CLEAN laundry, which will inevitably have to be washed again as they become dirty laundry because they were left sitting out, were walked on, pushed onto the floor and/or even mixed up with dirty laundry. THE HORROR!
If you are having problems putting your clean laundry away, this may be because you do not have enough space to put it away. If this is the case, you may suffer as many Americans do from having too many clothes. Clean out your closets, packing up out of season clothes and giving away clothing that no longer fits. Be ruthless. If you didn't wear it this season you are not going to wear it next winter either! Everything left should have a home.
Whistle while you work. I believe it is more economical to do the family laundry all together. But everyone is expected to help out. Awsumb is old enough now that he can gather and carry loads of laundry around. He can also switch the laundry to the dryer and can fold and put it away. Although I prefer to do laundry late at night, I didn’t want him to think clothes miraculously appear clean and folded as if the laundry fairy came to visit while he slept. So, I often arrange to have a load ready earlier in the day or save some for him to fold in the morning. (This takes great restraint from me because I prefer to put the towels away RIGHT THEN!) He is responsible for folding and putting away all towels in his bathroom, guest bathroom and kitchen. If he sees me folding towels I hardly have to ask anymore because he knows to come help do his “responsibility.” (read more in a future blog about responsibilities and allowance) The other night, Awsumb caught me folding towels after he was supposed to be in bed and ran in to help. OK, he may have just been avoiding bedtime, but I like to believe he knew it was his responsibility.
Awsumb and I often sing funny songs while we do housework together. I am sure this started when he was a toddler and I was trying to make day to day tasks entertaining. But, I am so glad I did this because now he thinks of it as sometime special we are doing together. Sometimes we sing an activity song about working together… Other times we make up silly words. Here is one of our favorites to the tune of Winnie the Pooh, “Mother and son, Mother and son, having some fun, getting things done, doot, do- doot- do, do- doot doot doot do.” When we work side by side our children we teach them that our home is important enough to us that we should respect it and keep it clean. We make it a together experience, not a chore.
We were out most of the weekend and ended up with a few loads lined up and waiting. I was able to quickly catch up because I had not let it turn into Mt. Saint Hardy. It didn’t take a miracle, but the will to just get it done.
What mountains have you moved today?
I must also mention the cruelest part of fairy tales is that as a young girl you may grow up to believe that once the princess gets the prince the story is over. In real life, that is just the beginning!
