Laundry Love

I am not a domestic goddess. I am not crafty. I can cook, but not bake. I pay someone to clean my house. Instead of meeting Papa Bear at the door in full make up with a mixed drink in my hand, I'm unshowered, wearing workout clothes, and desperately clutching my OWN glass of wine (I strictly follow the "put your OWN oxygen mask on first" philosophy). This is one of the many reasons this blog has never been a place to come for all tips domestic.

However, today that changes. This post is a direct result of a Facebook dialogue between friends. Apparently, my laundry system has changed one of my friend's life (who said Facebook was all bad?). There has been a request for further explanation of my system. Thus, this post.

For those of you who hate laundry, I hope this post makes you hate it a wee bit less. For those of you who already have your own system, yawn and move on! I've never claimed to be an expert at anything domestic...

My laundry "system" was born out of my extreme distaste for Laundry Day. Oh...you know what I'm talking about. The day you assign to getting the family laundry done. The day you move eight different loads from the washer, to the dryer, and then to your couch....where you intend to fold them, really, you do. But the sheer mass of clothing overwhelms you. So you either leave them there on the couch picking out what you need from the pile, or you move them to baskets where they wrinkle to the point that you are forced to re wash them or, gasp, iron.

This is what I did. Or, attempted to do. What ended up happening was I'd stay up until midnight trying to fold everything or I'd leave it in a wrinkled mess. Either way, I found myself grumpy and constantly feeling like laundry was taking me over.

So I decided to change things up. No more Laundry Day. Now it's Laundry Days. Literally. Every day. Wait...don't click away just yet!! Stick with me. I promise it's BETTER not worse!

Indeed, now I do Laundry basically every day. But, instead of doing ALL the Laundry in ONE day, I do SOME LAUNDRY every day. It's the whole "How do you eat an elephant?" mentality. One bite at a time.

I looked at my family's laundry loads, and then broke it down by days. This is what I came up with (might be TOTALLY different for your household):

Monday - Bear Cubs

Tuesday - Mama & Papa Bear

Wednesday - Workout Clothes & Delicates

Thursday - catch up day

Friday - Sheets & Towels (full confession: the cleaning lady does these)

Saturday - cleaning rags & towels

Sunday - Workout Clothes

The only "rule" I imposed on myself was this: each day's load had to be washed, folded, and put away by the end of the day. Sounds daunting at first, but when it's one little basket worth of laundry (instead of eight heaping baskets), it is really TOTALLY manageable!

So, for example, on Monday morning, I throw the cub's laundry in the wash, and then the dryer. If I have time during the day, I'll fold it. If not, as soon as Papa Bear starts bathing the kids, I sit down and fold the clothes. And, most days, I follow through on my rule of putting the laundry away. I'll admit, if I get behind on anything, it's the putting the clothes away part. But, at least the clothes are folded...right?

Again, I've found this method keeps me from spending a whole day washing and folding and getting behind. But, I've also found that it helps in other ways too. Most importantly, I'm not instantly behind when surprise events like, say, barfing cubs pop up. Because of the system, the machines aren't tied up, and I can throw in a quick load of dirty sheets one day and not get behind.

There are few other things that I do to stay on top of laundry as well. However, they might cross the line from organized into OCD. Those of you that know me know....that's a very fine line for me... But here's what they are:

• Stain fighting: each bedroom (plus the laundry room) has a stain fighter spray (you could just as easily use a stick). Any clothes that are stained get sprayed when the come off of the cub's/bear's body before they go into the hamper. That way, I don't forget to treat (remembering to treat is NOT my strong suit) and this gives time to treat the stain before washing.
• Pre-sorting: Papa Bear and I invested in one of those 3 bin laundry hampers. Instead of dropping all our clothes in one hamper, and then me having to sort the clothes later, we sort them into their loads (lights, darks, delicates) as we take the clothes off. This saves not only time, but my sanity, as I'm not great at sorting either.
• Spreadsheet: Okay. This is where it crosses the line from organized to OCD. The first step is admitting the problem, right? And y'all know how I like a good spreadsheet! Basically, I have the entire laundry schedule printed out on a spreadsheet and taped on the cabinet above the washer. I have the day of the week, the load scheduled for such day, and the directions (what cycle, how much detergent, dryer cycle...etc). My idea behind this was, should I ever become incapacitated, the laundry would still get done. And when I became un-incapacitated, I wouldn't have 18 loads of laundry to do. A Mama Bear can dream, can't she? It's basically just become fodder for OCD jokes. And I'm okay with that.

So, that's my system. Do you like it? Do you have a better system? Questions? Would love to hear what you think.

Be looking for another tip tomorrow. It is one I was taught recently that has changed our lives in another way. I'll I'm going to say is: be prepared to have your lunch world rocked.