Uncomplicated Housekeeping - The Laundry

Uncomplicated living didn’t come easy, Ill be honest, I still very much have to work at it on a nearly daily basis. However, along my journey to un-complicate life, I have stumbled upon, created, invented, and developed a very UNCOMPLICATED routine for day to day housekeeping, my nemesis. I mean, who wouldn’t rather take their kiddos to the zoo or sit on the floor for hours playing cars or baby dolls with their “only this little once” human beings, over daily chores!? I personally have had my fair share of guilt over choosing to do things with them instead of getting chores done and vice-versa, only the guilt of doing chores over spending time with them is much more intense. Either way, chores need to get done and our babes always want us to play with them (for now anyway) so finding the best most uncomplicated housekeeping routine was absolutely necessary for this momma. I had to go through a lot of trial and error, so I’ll only offer the tricks that been the most sustainable over the past few years. No sense in complicating your life with more advice than you already may be getting. I’m going to turn this into a series because I promised my posts would be short(er) and there are a lot of areas to cover, so please enjoy, the Uncomplicated Housekeeping series. 

#2 - THE LAUNDRY 

This is advice is coming from a once working mom of 1 to a SAHM mom of 2, who was desperate to get caught up on laundry once and for all. It was my most hated chore. I felt like it was never ending especially with babies and all their fun little blow outs.  I’ll be honest, getting out of laundry jail does take a little extra work to get started but with this trick I have been saved from the laundry demons indefinitely, or at least until we get back from a vacation... then the fun starts all over again. 

Here’s the secret to laundry, don’t hate me: do a small load every single day. Believe it or not this is a trick from the 1950’s housewife. And even though times have changed dramatically- it still works! It sounds extreme but it’s not that bad. Once you are all caught up and feeling your rhythm, you will find that you can skip a few days here and there.

Here are the basic steps to KUWTL (Keeping up with the laundry): 

Step 1- Spend ONE full day during the week/weekend or take a day off and get completely caught up on laundry. (Again, not as bad as it sounds, and it will pay off.) This works best with everyone out of the house but if you don’t have that luxury (I didn’t), it's doable just make it a YES day to all the TV the littles want to watch. Your day will look like this; wash, dry, fold/hang and put away properly, repeat, repeat, repeat. I promise you will only need to do this a couple times a year from now on.  

Now for the real secret, Step 2- For SAH moms or dads, do a small single load of laundry every single day to completion. Wash, dry, fold, & put away all before dinner time. Wash in the morning, dry after breakfast, fold and put away when kids are eating lunch or down for a nap. Once this becomes part of your day you’ll be all caught up and will be able to skip days. Just figure out what works best for you. If you are an on-the-go family and out of the house much of the day/week, I recommend washing a load before bed, dry first thing in the morning and before you leave for the day, lay all the clothes out on a piece of furniture or table so they don’t get wrinkled and then fold and put away when you return.  

For working parents; get rid of all laundry baskets and ask the whole family to participate, all dirty clothes go straight into the washer immediately. You can have one or two baskets in a dedicated area for whites/delicates. When you have a 3/4 full wash load, or a half full whites/ delicates basket, then start a load, put that load in the dryer ASAP and fold and put away before bed the same day. It sounds a lot more daunting than it is but when no one is asking for clean undies, their favorite shirt or Mr Blankey, anymore, the effort will be worth it. Not to mention after a few weeks it becomes less of a chore and more of a way of life. Especially with smaller loads, it’s much more manageable and shouldn’t take hardly anytime at all to put away. BONUS: doing this frees up the washer on the weekends for bed linens and that won’t feel like such a chore anymore either since at most you will only have one small load of clothes to complete and linens typically go right back on the beds. No more of those moments right before you are about to crawl into bed and you realize “Darn it! I still have to make the bed... oh %*&^ I never even put the sheets in the dryer!” Yes we too have slept on an unmade bed a time or two because I didn’t finished the darn load of sheets in time. 

 So that’s it, just a few minutes here and there throughout the day and only one or two loads every couple of weeks for linens and one or two full days of laundry every few months or less.  

Voila! Give it a try and let me know if this method works for you. I’ve been using it for a few years now and I’m completely at peace with my laundry situation. In fact I enjoy it, Gasp! BONUS #2- the best part is we have been able to reduce the amount of clothes we have because when everything is clean you realize you don’t need as much and you always have something to wear! It may save you money and space. You can thank me later :) 

If you need anymore help or want more laundry tips please ask in the comments below. This post could have been 20x longer because I have so many other tips but lets just keep this as uncomplicated as possible and should you need more guidance, Ill be right here. Happy Laundering Friends!  

*I have not taken any laundry tips from anyone or anywhere- this is a few years of my personal trial and error. I have started seeing more and more “don’t pay attention to the pile of laundry in the background” pics on social media and I want people to know they too can get out of laundry jail. I know, because I’ve been there. 

**** Stay tuned for Uncomplicated Housekeeping post #3...