I’m no laundry expert, I usually have a load or two patiently waiting for their turn in the washer but, laundry isn’t something I dread and it rarely builds up.
I have three tips and I hope you have more.
1. Start a load right when you get up.
Every morning I come down the stairs with a basket of dirty clothes in my hand {my boys or I emptied it the night before} I go straight to the laundry room {before I get coffee or anything} and start a load. My husband usually sees this and I think some guilt mechanism kicks in so he starts the lunches, its a brilliant plan.
Then later in the morning I move it to the dryer and by the afternoon it is folded and separated into the 3 stacks for the minions to take upstairs. I just lay it in folded piles or baskets by the stairs and remind them to take the clothes up and put theirs away. It sure does help once your children are old enough to pitch in.
2. Know when to hold them, know when to fold them
Our two youngest share a room so they have a bigger dresser for their folded clothes and we also ended up with this one little nightstand dresser. It’s filled with PJ’s. I RARELY buy new jammies. Old T shirts and thrifted bottoms are a plenty round these parts. I’m always happy when I see pjs in the laundry folding pile because that’s one thing I never fold. I just kind of clump it or roll it and put it with the rest of the folded laundry pile for that room and they know to throw it in the drawer. Also, I recently went through and purged lots of jammies. They really only need about 3 bottoms each, too many options and I end up with more to wash.
3. Start a sock basket
My sister just reminded me about the sock basket. Baskets again, sorry. My boys put their socks on right before they put their shoes on, so it makes sense to have all of their socks downstairs. I don’t match up and turn their socks right side out, they are big enough to figure that out on their own.
What are your laundry tricks?
I actually love doing laundry, I have been doing laundry since I was 9 year old and I get a weird sense of accomplishment after I am done. Even though I have to do it again in a day! I am not good at folding though.
xo
Katy
I try to do a load a day. With four kids plus my husband and I it doesn’t seem to be enough. I usually end up spending a day a week getting laundry done. Also, I hand up some of my laundry to dry because our dryer doesn’t work the best. It breaks the laundry time in half to have some on the line and the other in the dryer.
abeautifulcottagehome.blogspot.com
I most certainly do one+ load a day! Three boys, 13 acres…lots of dirt :) I also hang those lingerie bags on the walls and they put their socks and underwear in them. When it’s time to wash, I remove them, zip them up and throw them in the washer. We also use a sock & underwear basket~ so I dump them in and hang the bags back up. I also put a “Color” label with blocks of colors on one hamper and a “Whites” label on the other. I did this when my oldest was 3 and the visual helps them sort successfully! Finally, I put one of those movable hanging rods on wheels my laundry room, so I can immediately hang things up and avoid ironing. Thanks for this series, I am enjoying it :)
I am totally going to steal the lingerie bag idea. I swear my husband changes socks three times a day since there’s always to many in the wash and I never seem to have all of the matches.
I also have three kids. I find if I do their laundry separate from mine and my husband’s, it works best. My kids share a wicker hamper basket. Every week one is assigned to “help” me sort. I do 3-4 loads per week just for them. I do all pants/shorts together and all shirts together. In the winter most things are dark colored, in the summer I have more whites to do. Then I do all their pj’s, socks and undies all together in one load. I find if I break up their laundry by pants and shirts, it’s much easier for me. I hang all their laundry to dry, they go into the dryer for about 5-10 minutes to get wrinkles out and then hang. Everything goes into my closet, thankfully it’s big, to dry out.
My husband and I share a double wicker hamper one white side, one dark side. We both have enough socks and undies for about 2 weeks. When I get low, I know it’s time to do a load of ours. It’s nice just washing, taking it up to our bedroom and sorting on our bed, then it’s just staying in our one room. I do all of our shirts together so I know I need all hangers, and then all pants together so I know I need our 4 tiered metal pant hangers. I don’t like a cluttered mudroom so I try not to bring hangers down I don’t need.
To keep my sanity, I try to wash all the laundry on Monday and then the kids and I fold and hang everything on tuesday while watching Disney Channel. That way I am not always doing laundry. I will do a load if absolutely necessary, but usually it is bedding, towels or blankets. I love not having to worry about laundry EVERY day.
Genius idea to have the socks downstairs by the shoes, why didn’t I think of that? Thanks!
I need to start putting in a load first thing every day. (I’ve read that before, maybe FlyLady?)
But I LOVE having my kids help (they are 5, 3 and 2) put away clean clothing. I only put away the “church” clothes that I want folded. The older girls sort all their clothing into the correct drawers and put it away. They also help with towels and washcloths for the kitchen and bathrooms. I might have to try the sock basket thing, though.
Thanks for all these great ideas and tips. Sometimes a nudge is what we need!
I do this too! Except I usually start a load when I go to bed and then throw it in the dryer when I wake up. I have a basket on top of the dryer for missing socks.
Oh my! I love the sock basket idea! I hate sorting and folding socks. Definitely going to give this idea a try. Thank you so much!
I have 7 kids, ranging from almost 14 years down to almost 19 months. We have a laundry “party” each afternoon after I finish drying the clothes (usually 2-3 loads) on the lines. Each child has an assigned place to sit and I sort to those places. They each fold their own clothes (we start training this at 3 years) and put them away. They also have an assigned extra once they are past 6 years. The extras are kitchen linens, bathroom linens, sheets/blanket or helping a younger sibling with their clothes. I fold only mine, my husbands, the babys and the church clothes for those under 10.
Socks/underwear: this year I bought each child a different brand/type that is easily discernable from the others. This makes the sorting easy. Again, they put away.
you’re my hero. seriously.
ditto!
brilliant! We have two children living at home now, and hope for a larger family in coming years–I’ll definitely keep these tips in mind!
Each of my kids (I have 3, 2 boys who are not far apart in size and a girl) have their own laundry bucket (ie: trash can) for colored clothes in the laundry room, and also a whites bucket. When each kid’s bucket is full, I would wash their laundry (they are now doing their own as they were complaining). I fold/hang it all to avoid disastrous looking clothes, and set piles outside their rooms at which they are required to put the clothes away. I take their hanging clothes to the closets for them . And….waalaa!! Their laundry is so much easier to get done, noone’s clothes end up in another’s pile or mixed up!
When I do the whites, I hang and fold what needs to be done and leave the pile of socks & undies in the hallway at which they all need to go through and take care of their own.
Just last week I had a “light-bulb moment” and quit folding my PJs. I don’t care if they are wrinkled, so there is no reason to fold them. I don’t really have a system, by I only have two laundry baskets. One is stationary in my laundry room for dirty clothes, the other has handles so I take clothes to & from the laundry room. Only having one basket for dirty clothes helps me to know when I have a load ready. I usually wash clothes two days a week- usually day or so before the weekend and then another on Monday. I bought some quality hangers a couple years ago and have found that they help out a ton. I am no longer wrestling with the clothes in our closets and we purge them every few months.
One of my tricks is to do the laundry during what California considers off-peak hours. You get a discount on your bill when you. Clothing is washed Monday evenings after my children sort their own laundry. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays, I wash sheets and towels (all white). We have a sock box, which I think I’ll be changing to a basket. All the socks go into it, and whomever chore it is for the month, folds them Tuesday after homework. If I wash the towels Tuesday, they’re folded Wednesday by whomever chore it is. I always spray stains before the clothing goes into the hamper. My kids will leave the stained item on the washing machine for me to spray. I always use white vinegar with my white loads.
Ick I think I let out an audible groan when I was readying your post title and came to the work laundry. I am one those who totally dreads it and I don’t even have kids yet. I’m going to implement some of these tips and hopefully it’ll work.
Ugh, laundry is the worst. As I am sitting my lazy bum at the computer there are 9 piles of clean clothes on the fireplace stone-thingy just waiting to get put away. 1 for each person in the family and an extra pile for my daughter that changes her clothes all the time. I’m still a little confused on the socks down stairs thing. Where do you keep them?
I started a new laundry “system” about a year ago and it has worked wonders. Tuesday is laundry day. I also start a load as soon as I get up and keep them running back to back as much as possible (between school drop-offs, etc). I set up a utility table in the basement and as a load dries, I dump it on the table and fold it right then if I have time, or wait until naptime and fold a bunch at once. I had my husband hang a bar down there so I can fold, hang, everything in the basement and bring it all upstairs at once. Before I felt like my living room was always littered with laundry and this way, I don’t have to look at it all day (or two :) while I’m working on it. I usually take a few toys down to entertain my kiddos while I fold/switch loads.
I do laundry by kid. No sorting. Period. It’s easier to wash 1 kids stuff on cold, and fold 1 kids stuff. I kick my kids out of the laundry routine at 10. Currently I have 3 over ten and an 8 year old who thinks he’s 10 and does his own laundry… 4 down, 2 more to go. OH… and hubby began doing his laundry early in our marriage. He considers it his contribution to my sanity. He says it doesn’t make sense that he should make more work for me when he’s perfectly capable of doing that simple task himself. In 15 years of marriage… I’ve done his laundry maybe 5 times.
I wrote about my laundry routine for our family of 8 here… it’s been liberating for me.
http://www.prettyorganizedpalace.blogspot.com/2009/02/laundry-routine.html
I just came across this blog tonight- i will be reading! i am recently a stay at home mom of 2 (almost 3 yrs and almost 2 months) and I am trying to figure out how to have a less messy nest- I am totally interested in any tips I can get!
And I love that you used the word “minions”. That is a favorite of mine these days- that is what I call the people that report to my husband at work- when talking to him- not them! :)
My sons are 2 years apart (roughly). Once the younger was a toddler, I started buying athletic socks for them, a different color at the top for each boy. We didn’t know the younger was color blind so his colors never matched or he wore his brothers. Fail. So I just started buying white socks for them…didn’t have to match, just dump them all in the drawer. Never fold jammies, stuff them in the drawer. Hubby has particular socks he likes and as they are all the same, I just toss them in the drawer. He is perfectly capable of pulling out two of them on his own.
Sock Basket! Brilliant! If we had a decent-sized mudroom or entry, I’d have to do that for my daughter. She’s three, and constantly taking off her socks. Every time we have to leave the house, I need to search the house for a cleanish pair of socks.
Oh, and about laundry. I used to do each kid separately, then mine, hubby’s and towels together in however many loads was necessary (colours, darks, whites). Now I do all the clothes together, separating into loads of brights and dulls, and of course the white load (which always gets bleached with fabric safe bleach. I love my crisp white bleach-scented sheets!). And now I do towels, kitchen towels, and bibs separately from the clothes. It was so frustrating to take a whole load upstairs to fold it, only to have to carry half of it back downstairs to put in the kitchen. Now I just fold the towel load downstairs.
Ahh, laundry. The bane of my existence. As I currently have 3 overflowing laundry baskets calling to me, I think I could probably use some of these tips!
If I’m organised, I can fill my washing machine and program it to run early in the morning. Then all I have to do is hang it out (I’m Aussie. Dryers are for when it’s raining.) There are four people in my household and four quadrants to my Hills Hoist, so everyone gets their own quadrant. Therefore, clothes come inside already sorted. I find that if I don’t put the washing away immediately, it hangs around the house. Putting away one load is only a minor pain, but having to put away a couple of loads after procrastination is NO FUN.
I don’t wash on days I work, and try to avoid washing on Sundays. My machine is large so I am fitting 5 loads a week into 3-4 days.
yay – another aussie :) all this talk about dryers and I was wondering if I was the only one who hung my clothes out to dry?? love the tips, love your blog and loving cleaning up my nest :)
My favorite sock solution is one I got from Real Simple magazine. Have everyone safety pin their socks together when they take them off. The socks then go to the hamper, washer, dryer, and drawer together. The pin is removed when it is time to put them on again. I keep several small magnets around to keep the pins on when they are not being used. We now have many fewer odd socks.
Another good tip I’ve gotten from Real Simple was to have a jar of clothes pins by your hamper to mark stains. On laundry day you won’t have to search for the stain before spraying.
It took me 11 1/2 years to figure out this jewel.
I separated too much.
I had a stack for jeans. One for dark shirts. One for pullovers. One for fleece pjs. One for my delicate shirts. One for dirty, filth covered work pants. One for every garment in our home. It created chaos in my laundry room. So guess what I did? In January of last year, after my husband did every stitch of piled up laundry in our home because he couldn’t find anything clean, I decided to start washing the towels, jeans, and pullovers together. They all take about the same amount of time to dry, so in they go together. Sometimes I even wash…gasp…whites with colors. I have had no bleeding issues, and my laundry has stayed pretty well caught up since JANUARY!! Even before we had kids I was terrible with laundry, and now we have four, and I am doing great!
It is amazing how a piled up laundry room can suck the life out of you.
More on socks – my older two girls are 6 and 9 and I used to seperate their socks. But I finally figured out they wear the same size sock and have for years. No more separating. We fold and pair socks. They share a room so they go in one sock drawer that they both pull from.
my laundry tricks (and maybe they have been mentioned already :)
1. put a load on before bed, with the timer, that way I can get them hung (inside/out) first thing in the morning, and they are dry by the end of the day.
2. i keep my laundry basket in the bathroom, where dirty laundry accumulates at bath time :)
thanks for your tips…i am totally going to do the sock basket!
My laundry tricks:
I have 4 stackable laundry baskets in the laundry room where I can sort into whites, reds, shirts(because I hang these to dry on the hanger….It saves a step), and then everything else. These stacking baskets have room to put things in/out while they are stacked, and they only take up the floor space of one basket.
I have the smallest laundry hampers I can find. The quicker they fill up, the faster they make it to the laundry room to get sorted and washed, so it keep the laundry from piling up too much. (Most of the time, at least!) Also, the smaller they are, the more the younger kids can carry them to the laundry room and help out.
We try to buy all of the same kinds of socks for each person. My husband has his preferred kind, and we try to buy all new of the same style, and toss or donate the old. If we have to replace with a new style, we donate the old to Goodwill, and keep going witih all new of only the one style. This way, there are never any socks to match. Same for me, and I buy the kids each their own style too. It saves a ton of hassle with sorting socks, and completely eliminates the issue of having a bunch of socks with no mate.
I love the idea of stacking hampers! My issue is that we have no laundry room, only an alcove where the washer and dryer sit, with no floor space. If I stacked hampers in the BATHROOM, the laundry could be sorted before it ever came out into the laundry area. I’m sick of climbing over stacks of dirty laundry that’s piled up because we sort right in front of the washer (the hall!) Thank you Michelle!
I have 2 girls 13 and 8, they share a bathroom. They each have 2 extra drawers in the bathroom, 1 for underwear and socks and 1 for pj’s and tshirts. In the laundry room each family member has a hook, for hanging clothes and a basket for folded clothes. After I fold or hang they are to carry the basket and hangers and put away. I also have a small basket that the junk from pockets etc goes…
I’m totally digging the sock idea!!! We are always sending the boys upstairs to grab their socks just as we head out the door and that involves a lot of whining!
Oh and I refuse to fold little boy underwear and my underwear. Seriously….they are too small to get wrinkled. Then, when I do laundry, even my three yr old and help put his own undies away into the drawer-o-undies.
I am not sure if you read comments after 160 some (Yikes :) ) BUT I wanted to let you know that you inspired me to “go crazy” ;) and last night I decided to stop folding my 3 months olds bibs and burp cloths. Aw yeah! I am a FREE woman! Now I have more time to fold my twin 3 yr old boys clothes and let me tell you with potty training there are a lot of undies that need stain treatment. Thanks!
My son is only 1 so his socks are tiny. I keep a small/med size mesh laundry bag hanging off his laundry hamper and putt all of his dirty socks in that. That way they all get washed and dried together and I have yet to lose a sock!
Almost a year ago I got a tip from a friend about laundry that has truly saved my life. We have 5 kids. I was getting so frustrated with how much laundry I was doing, especially when I realized that most of the things I was washing were clean. The kids had just thrown them in the basket, because their drawers were too full. So, we purged. We got rid of things that didn’t fit anymore, or were too stained. Then I had each child choose 3 pairs of pants/shorts, (I don’t see anything wrong with wearing pants/shorts twice before they get washed – we usually don’t get that dirty around here) 6 shirts, 2 Sunday outfits and 3 sets of pajamas. We boxed up all the excess clothing per child and stuck it in the basement. This works really well at changing seasons – box up the summer clothes in winter, and vice versa. They kept all their socks and undies (about 10 pairs of each.) So, each child essentially has one week’s worth of clothing in their rooms. We hang up all shirts and Sunday outfits. The rest goes in the drawers. I don’t care if they fold them or not. (I used to, but decided it wasn’t worth fretting over, now that everything fits in the drawers.) We do laundry basically one day a week. It takes most of the day to do about 6 loads – if you include the dirty towels. So, sometimes it stretches into 2 days if we’re busy. But, it has really cut down on my stress to not be constantly getting upset about kids not putting clothes away, and sending clean clothes back to the laundry pile. The kids are also much less stressed, because they can actually fit all their clothes in their drawers. :)
I do the sock basket thing and just started it recently! LOVE IT! I was always sending them back up to get socks on and it made no sense. Now I keep all their play socks or dirty socks as we call them, in a basket in the gargae with all their shoes. Their good socks are kept up where they won’t get stained with red clay!
I keep a pretty strict laundry routine and only do certain loads on certain days. We have three boys aand we play anywhere from 2 – 6 baseball games per weekend. I have to know their uniforms will be ready so I keep a hamper in the garage on the weekends and they strip in there when we get home. Less dirt in my house and less laundry to bring back down. Once all the games are done for the weekend or practices that load goes in to prepare for week night games.
Our regular laundry is done on Tuesdays and Fridays and I only do one load of whites a week, no exceptions. I don’t dread laundry , I always think that lots of dirty and stinky clothing means lots of happy and healthy little boys!
I too have boys. AS far as laundry, I wash throughout the week but socks are a HUGE pet peeve of mine. I insist that when they take their socks off, They fold them together. so that one sock is within the other. This way they go in the wash together (I do separate them in the wash, just the pair is in the same load) and come out together. If for whatever reason one comes out without the other, I put it in a small wicker picnic basket in my room. Periodically I go through and find pairs and WA LA no lost socks!
a sock basket by the shoe basket! i could kiss you, love it!
laundry works similarly for us. i wash a load, dry and air dry (i have a theory that clothes last longer if they are air dried). the kids rotate chores so each day one folds. then we all grab our own pile and put it away. now that we have a system, i don’t hate laundry anymore.
I love washing and drying clothes too! All our neighbors say how good the “area” around our house smells. I have two toddlers and a toddler husband so I wash a LOT of clothes! Loads of clothes every day so I have to love it!
My husband takes baskets all the way to the basement (I HATE IT IN THE BASEMENT) and I wash and dry them and he brings them back upstairs for me and I fold and put them all away! Both kids rooms and husbands closet… I am still in the process of training my husband to check the dryer every time he gets home from work, but that is still a work in progress!
My laundry tip, something I have done for decades: buy each person 12 IDENTICAL pairs of socks. That’s all they get, those 12 pairs. You never need to match up and fold them or roll them into little balls. 12 pairs go straight into their socks drawer; the owner can count out 2 socks every morning. When they start to get ratty, just throw away all 12 pair and buy 12 new IDENTICAL pair. So simple! I learned this from a lady I used to babysit for. Her husband told her to do it for him.
If you are a sock diva, then this might not work, but then again, you could perhaps change your attitude on socks and try it out.
We did this for socks last year and it is Life Changing!!! My husband does have three different kinds of socks, but the black socks are all the same, the white socks are all the same and the brown socks are all the same. I bunch them by color in his drawer and I’m done! I wash the laundry in loads by person (instead of by color) so for my girls and I, I don’t have to sort socks at all – just stack and go!
Matching up socks is overrated- Love the idea of a sock basket!
I wash bed linens in the order they go onto the bed, ex: mattess cover, sheets & pillow cases, blanket then quilt/bedspread. As soon as a load is dry I put it on the bed and by the time everything is dry the bed is remade.
We have four laundry baskets…darks, reds, whites, sheets and towels. It’s my kids’ “chore” to sort the clothes into the right baskets, and then I wash it throughout the week as each hamper gets full. It has saved me a lot of time. We also hardly ever buy pj’s, and that does make it a lot easier. We have a 6, 5, and 2 yr. old, and are going through the adoption process for older kids. SO we will be definitely be doing the sock basket idea, I can’t imagine laundry with six kids, sometimes I already feel like it’s out of control! :) Really good tips, thanks!
Years ago I bought two sets of Sterilite drawers with two big deep drawers each. They snapped together into one tall tower, so there’s four drawers. It’s perfect for sorting laundry. It takes very little floor space and each drawer/basket holds exactly one load of laundry. I taped big numbered labels on each drawer – 1 drawer is whites and kitchen linens, 2 is pinks and pastels (we have 3 girls, 1 boy, we wash a LOT of pink), 3 is jeans and dark shirts, 4 is reds and purples and dark towels. The kids (13 to 5) know which drawers to sort their clothes in. They are responsible for bringing their own laundry down to sort every morning. I usually spend two days a week doing laundry – not full-time, just shifting loads from washer to dryer in between carpooling and other household stuff, and trying to fold as they come out of the dryer. It’s usually heavy on Monday with bedding and towels, then lighter/a few catch-up loads on Thursday. Each child has a laundry basket of their own that fits on a shelf under the folding counter in the laundry room. Their folded clothes go in their basket, and they’re responsible for putting their own clothes away and returning their basket to the laundry room.
I used to fold everything, but don’t any more – shirts that are nice enough for school are hung up in their closets – it’s easier to find their shirts that way, rather than pawing through a drawer. My 5 and 7-year olds are almost exactly the same size, so they share just about all their clothes – so I don’t have to sort their socks/undies any more. All the kids know how to fold and are expected to help when it’s their turn. I got sick of matching all the socks (this one has a hole, but its mate doesn’t, etc.). So we burned all the icky socks in a bonfire and I bought new ones – each kids’ are different sizes, with different colored print labels (Hanes) on the bottom. One child’s is green, one is purple, etc.). Easy to match up. Other than church clothes, I don’t iron. Shake it out, hang it up, looks good. DH irons his own shirts.
I have to say, I LOVE my laundry room. When we moved into our current home, there was no laundry at all. The hook-ups were crazy – the washer was in one area, and the dryer was 20 feet away in an entirely different room. And there wasn’t even a real dryer vent, just a hose sticking out of the window! Schlepping heavy baskets of wet laundry from one room to another was no fun. We converted a small bedroom off the kitchen into a full-time laundry and sewing/crafts room. Love, love it.
Just wish DH would figure out after 18 years that his method for folding pants is wrong, wrong, wrong. Oh well, at least he’s folding them, right?
We keep socks downstairs, too. We have a built in area near the door to the garage that has cubbies and everyone’s shoes go in their cubby. In the living room, we have an armoire for the tv, and in one of the drawers, I keep the boys’ socks. It helps that there is no going back upstairs for socks!
Wow, this was encouraging…
Maybe if I put a system in place I won’t hate doing laundry. I’m not married yet so I still have time to practice (“,)
Your writing is certainly extremely convincing and this is most likely why I am taking the effort in order to comment.
The sock basket idea is brilliant! We have done that for years and saved countless hours of pointless matching and folding! Not to mention the fact that every time my little ones tried matching we ended up with everyone’s socks mismatched.
I cant stand all the loose socks hanging around my laundry room. They migrate on top of the dryer and starting today they are going to the basket. Thanks for the brilliant idea.
Good day.This article was really interesting, particularly since I was investigating for thoughts on this matter last Wednesday.
So happy to see this post, with 5 kids, we have always had a sock basket!!! It’s funny, my girls have never matched their socks, striped socks, polka dots…didn’t matter…and now there are companies selling socks that don’t match! Why didn’t I think of that!! =)
LOVE the idea of the UN-MATCHED socks in the basket! Why did that never occur to me before?! :) I have a sock basket by the door near the shoes but never did it occur to me to put them in loosely! Genius! Thanks for sharing this!