Let's talk about a completely non-inspiring topic: Laundry. Ok, in reality, I find it a bit inspiring, but my husband does not!
For certain household routines, I usually follow a ton of great ideas I got from Becky Rapinchuk author of Simply Clean and inventor of the Clean Mama brand. She has so many great ideas of how to maintain cleanliness in your home on a regular basis without feeling like you have to dedicate your weekends to cleaning. She suggests washing a load of laundry every day from start to finish. Wash, dry, fold, put away.
Recently I was listening to a podcast that kind of clicked with me immediately called The Lazy Genius Podcast where Kendra Adachi talks about being a genius about the things that matter, and lazy about the things that don't. She HATES doing laundry and readily admits it. So the idea of doing a little laundry every day just drives her nuts. She would much rather do it all on one big old laundry day where she washes 4, 5, maybe 6 loads of laundry all at once.
But... I can't do laundry quite the way either of these lovely ladies describe it because I don't have a dryer. The only way I can finish a load from start to finish in one day is to go to the laundromat and pay for what I can otherwise do for free. The only way I can wash all my laundry in one day is if I go to the laundromat and pay for what I can otherwise do for free. I once heard someone say that "God and I have a deal. I wash the dishes and He dries them." That's true for me too, with the exception of certain items that need to be dried immediately to prevent their ruin, but it's also true of my laundry.
So, boring as the topic is, I am telling you what my laundry routine kind of looks like.
I usually do a load of laundry every other day, give or take. The way I do a little laundry every day is I alternate washing days and folding/putting away days. That's really it. So if Monday I wash and hang a load of laundry, I will fold and put away that laundry on Tuesday, or maybe on Wednesday if there's not tons of laundry or if I don't feel like dealing with it on Tuesday for whatever reason.
Now for a little bonus - my laundry hacks. First, I save folding laundry to be done at the end of the day when my energy is lower and instead of thinking of it as a chore, I think of it as busy work for my hands while I do something enjoyable with my head. I can think, I can chat, I can listen to a podcast, audiobook, or music. Another thing I do is to start a load of laundry in the morning when I'm about to start lots of other chores or breakfast clean-up. Then I go and hang it after my other chores are done. Or if I'm feeling ambitious at night, I will put the laundry in the wash with the delay-start function, and in the morning I can hang the laundry after breakfast.
There are a couple of times I take my laundry to the laundromat nearby. The first instance would be when I'm washing sheets so that they are dry the same day. Here in Taiwan the weather is exceptionally humid nearly all the time. On the 15th floor where we live the moisture in the air starts to condensate (as opposed to levels nearer the ground) and so on very rainy, foggy days I sometimes take the laundry to be dried automatically, or I bring it inside where we have the dehumidifier or air conditioner running.
One thing that is pretty common in Taiwan is to hang your wet clothes on hangers and then hang them on the line. This saves a step for clothes that need to be hung in the wardrobe, which is nice. I also think of hanging clothes as being the first step to folding. This is because, if you hang an item very straight to dry, it's already been folded in half once, or laid straight, in the case of something like a T-shirt or pants.
When my baby was very small, I would always hang or fold laundry on the bed while she did tummy time and watched. That brings back sweet memories.
No comments:
Post a Comment