There are few things in life that are certain. These include death, taxes, and laundry. Yup, that’s right. The literally never-ending task of washing clothes, drying them, folding them, ironing, and putting them away.
It feels impossible to be caught up on laundry because you and your child are always (usually) wearing clothes! It can be mundane and difficult at the same time. Lucky for you, I have some laundry tips that may make it a little easier. Now, a warning here—these tips are not groundbreaking. In fact, you may scoff and say I should be doing more. But I am taking a realistic approach to this, or maybe a lazy one? Either way, I believe life is too short and days go by too quickly (especially for moms) to worry so much about laundry. So if you’re looking for a way to simplify things try my tips.
3 Quick Laundry Tips
Sort Your Clothes Ahead of Time
This suggestion isn’t what you think. When it comes to sorting my laundry, technically I don’t—but here is what I do. I have 3 baskets. One for dirty clothes—this includes everything, from my daughter’s pajamas, my workout clothes, to my husband’s work clothing. They all hang out together. Then I have one for towels and linens, and lastly one for white towels and linens (this one gets bleached). So yes, I am one of those people who don’t sort by lights and darks, or by material. I put all the clothes in the washer together and guess what, they get clean. I even wash them with warm water.
Jeans will get cleaned when they are washed with t-shirts and socks. Your dirty underwear will not interfere with your sports bras. To me, separating things is more work than is worth the effort. It really doesn’t matter. In my opinion and experience, as long as you’re not overfilling your machine, your clothing will get clean regardless of what other types of clothing its washed with. Now I will separate things I want to wash on a delicate cycle, these are mainly my clothes, not my husband’s or daughter’s so it’s easy for me to separate.
Have a Stain Bucket
I live with a 2-year-old and a “grown” man. Spills and stains happen every day. Instead of sorting things when I am getting ready to start a load, I have a small bucket that sits in my laundry room and whenever something is stained it goes directly in there. Sometimes, depending on the severity of the stain I rinse and pre-treat but not regularly. These items usually sit in the bucket until I spray them right before starting a load. Again, this won’t work for everything, but for me 9 times out of 10 the item comes out of the dryer stain free.
Hang Things to Dry
This may sound like an extra effort but really it’s not. One thing I discovered is if I hang things to dry most of the time I don’t have to iron them. I avoid the wrinkles caused by the dryer (mostly) and can wear things right off the hanger. I often do this for my shirts and jeans.
One of the rules I have is I do not buy clothes for myself or anyone else in my household that require dry cleaning. Now sometimes that can’t be avoided. Maybe a dress for a special occasion or a suit for a job interview, these are irregular and therefore I don’t have to worry about cleaning these items regularly. Of course its easier to have someone else clean my clothes but for me, it also requires thinking ahead and remembering to have said item taken and picked up from the dry cleaner, and I just don’t have time for that on a regular basis. I have bought some items second hand that say on the tag “dry clean only” but usually since it was cheaper than buying new, I throw it in on the delicate cycle and hope for the best.
These are my every day, real-life laundry tips.
I am a big believer in “good enough” so this is the approach I take. Being lax on things like laundry helps me enjoy motherhood more. Of course, sometimes there are exceptions like when I was getting things ready for my daughter to be born and I washed all her clothing and blankets separate from my husband’s or mine. But overall this is the approach I take. No one has ever told me my clothes don’t look clean so maybe it’s worth a try. If you want to approach laundry in a more simplistic, stress-free way, give it a shot!
What are your laundry tips?
