Now, some of you that know me may be wondering…who does this lady think she is giving laundry (and housekeeping and cookingJ) tips? Well, I know I’m not the expert in any of those fields. But I also know that I get really discouraged and bogged down trying to keep up with basic housework. And it seems that most of the tips and suggestions I read are from people who have it all together in the first place! What do they know about my honest struggle? So…why not share what makes life work for me…self-proclaimed slob, pack-rat, couch potato (well not really couch, but folding chair potato just doesn’t sound right and that’s where I spend much of my spare time in front of my computer) and harried mother of three?!?! Anyway…I have always had a problem with laundry piles! Even when it was washed and dried, I was often too tired to put it away properly so it sat in laundry baskets, wrinkling away like an aging woman.
So tip number one is for you mothers of small children who just feel like there are not enough hours in your day. This at least helped our family to not have to dig through EVERY basket in the house to find a certain article of clothing. When I had three little ones underfoot and was going through a bout of nerve issues and felt down in the dumps most days (I hesitate to use the word depression because I don’t really think I fully understand that emotion nor do I want to pretend to!) my girls weren’t old enough to help me fold the unending laundry but they knew which clothes belonged to whom. We had 6 laundry baskets and/or hampers. So when the laundry was mostly done for the week, we would make a game of dumping everything in a pile on the living room floor. Then we would line the empty hampers and baskets up and assign one to each member of the family. We usually did this by size or color. Then, we would sort the clean clothes out by person. We kept underwear and socks in one general pile. Those would get folded or matched and put away as being small items, it was easier for them to get lost among the t-shirts and pajamas. Now at least when Daddy was looking for a shirt, he only had to go through his basket, not sorting through all five family member’s clothes! I would also like to convince myself that this was good education for my young daughters in matching and sorting skills, but I’m not sure if I can go that far J
Now for those of you that have very young school age children, you will be surprised what they are capable of if you give them a chance. Our middle daughter in particular enjoyed helping me to sort the laundry before washing, so that was special time for just the two of us. This also opened my eyes to the realization that all three girls were capable of basic sorting. At this particular house, we had a very large walk-in closet in the bathroom/laundry room. Tony was able to build a low shelf that would hold three 18 gallon Rubbermaid totes on and under the shelf. One of each for whites, brights, denim, uniforms/dress clothes, tshirt type materials that we don’t want to shrink and one for lights. Every family member was responsible for sorting their own clothes. This made a huge difference in my laundry day! My biggest dread was sorting. Once that was out of the way, I didn’t mind doing the washing and drying. But sometimes it took me hours to just get in and get the sorting done. Imagine being able to see at a glance what totes were full and just picking it up and throwing that load in the washer! It was great! And then we moved to a house with a laundry room and no walk-in closet. Well, let me assure you, after going back to the previous struggle of getting the laundry sorted and then having it piled all over the computer room floor for two days, it didn’t take many months for Tony to make something work regardless of space. I now have five (six wouldn’t fit) identical hampers lining the hall outside my bathroom door. No, it’s not Martha Stewart décor but it’s better than piles of laundry, it’s practical and it works for me. It’s also a nice surface on which to stack folded clothes before they are handed to a child to take to their room.
Folded clothes? Did I say folded clothes? Oh, yes, on to my next revelation. My children are older now and I am a part/time working mother. I don’t have extra hours in my day to deal with laundry issues when I need to be spending time with my family, helping with homework or getting lunches ready for the next day. I find that if I take five or ten minutes to grab the laundry when it is fresh from the dryer and fold it, I save time and keep my family looking neat by folding it immediately so it doesn’t wrinkle.
But I have also had many nights that I am so ready for bed and want to hurry. But the dryer just buzzed with that last load of laundry. So what do you do if you pull out a shirt that is inside out because someone didn’t care how they took it off? Leave it that way! Gasp! Fold a shirt inside out? Yes, who cares how it looks in the drawer. My children are old enough to turn their clothes right side out. So I have adapted theory number one: they took it off in a hurry, they can spend their own time fixing it. Who cares if the crease folds in or out when the shirt is put on? Theory number two: it doesn’t matter if pajamas are wrinkled. So if you are in a hurry to get on to another task or to bed and will have more time tomorrow, fold the shirts, leave the pajamas and underwear in a neat pile on top of the dryer. They won’t lay there forever and you will have made your husband or children happy because you spent time with them instead of all evening in the laundry room.
Oh, and my kids often help with the sock sorting and towel folding.
And…Tony had another brainstorm in our space-challenged laundry area, to “install” (twist until it’s the right length and holds fast) a shower curtain rod in the frame above my washer and dryer. I can immediately hang skirts, pants and shirts after taking them out of the dryer (I think he was tired of looking like a hunchback from me using the banister to drape his dress shirts over!)
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