Laundry 101

One thing we are never short on around here, is laundry.  Typically we're doing laundry at least 3 days a week.  Rarely do we do it on Tuesday's when the babies are here {we watch two of the sweetest little ones on Tuesday's Miss E - 2 yrs and Mr. L - 5 1/2 mos}; and we try to avoid Sunday, the Lord's day.

However, we will do laundry on Tuesday or Sunday if it's sunny and warm enough to hang laundry on the line.... Here are a few tips from my laundry room {AKA the garage!!}

Our System:

~We use several laundry baskets for sorting.  I've taken a sharpie, labelling each basket with a certain type of load {ie light towels, darks, whites...}
 
~We make our own laundry soap; it's super inexpensive and washes just as good if not better than the store bought stuff.

~My new favourite stain remover....Water and a Fels Naphtha bar.  Dampen the spot, rub the bar over the spot, let sit at least one hour before laundering.

~We don't use dryer sheets.

~The best tool for getting the dirt out of the clothes is the "soak" setting on the washer.  Generally I use soak, and pre-wash before washing the boys jeans and white socks.  Sometimes we'll soak the towel loads also.

~Allow wet items to dry before tossing them into the hamper/baskets. Wet things {dish clothes, towels} tend to sour. Soured laundry requires extra soaking and care- to get the smell out. I hang wet dish clothes around the edge of our towel hampers. 

~Soaking whites with 1/2C of borax helps make them whiter.  The only negative I've noticed with the homemade soap is that Hubby's white undershirts seem grey.

~Change the bed sheets/pillowcases once a week. We do this on Friday's making Friday a big laundry day.  I do soak sheets and pillowcases.  During the warm season I like to dry these items outside.

~Recently, to save  using hot water, every load has been washed on the cold setting. {the price of natural gas in our area has really gone up this year} I add 1/2C homemade laundry soap to the soaking load, no more to the prewash cycle; then 1/4-1/3C to the wash cycle.  I usually choose a 6 minute wash.

~If you have the space and warmth in your home to air dry- go for it!  Unfortunately we do not have the space for this, however, I do keep one of those accordion styled drying racks for hand dry items such the girls dance clothes. 

~If you can use an outdoor clothesline, go for that method of drying.  Sunny days are the exception to for Tues/Sun. During the warm season I watch the weather for those sunny warm days that we can use the clothesline instead of the dryer.  

~Stay on top of the pile!

~Train your children early how to do laundry- start to finish! Involve them in the day to day maintenance.

~My favourite resource on how to do laundry is this book.

To be continued.....