Manage Laundry & Increase Family Time
Let’s be honest…most of us have a “laundry chair” or side table where the laundry that has overwhelmed us lives. And we don’t let our laundry live on the laundry chair because we are lazy. We let it live their awhile, so that we can use our time doing things we love a lot more than laundry. However, with a little intention, laundry can become less overwhelming.
Managing laundry is personal and the logistics are dependent upon your homes’ layout. Rather than share a list of steps or tips you can do to manage your laundry, I will share with you principles, guiding questions, and a radical idea that can help you craft a system that will help you.
My goal is to help you design a laundry management system catered to your your laundry, your personality, and your home. If you’d like a step by step guide for using these principles in your home click here. I will also share with you how I apply these principles and answer these questions in my home.
Principle 1: The more clothes you have the more clothes you have to wash. If you limit the number of clothes you have, then you can limit the amount of laundry you can create in the first place. Consider the following questions:
Generally, do you feel like you have too many clothes?
If the answer is no, then move on. This doesn’t apply to you.
If the answers is yes, then consider the following follow up questions:
Do you like the clothes you have?
Do you have to wear two sets of clothes that you wear in a day? (For example, a work uniform, and your after work clothes.)
If yes, can you reduce your after work clothes or rewear part of your uniform?
Principle 3 is a difficult one for me to follow. I definitely feel like I have too many clothes. I want to create a seasonal capsule wardrobe for myself. I am hoping to get each capsule down to about 20 items in part so that I only have to WASH 20 items.
Principle 2: The more often you wear your clothes, the less you have to wash them. If you are able to re-wear clothes before washing them, then you will have a lot less laundry. Consider the following questions:
Is there anything you could re-wear to reduce your laundry?
Jeans can be a great place to start.
Do you own sweaters or shirts that are getting a bit tattered?
Consider wearing them more, and washing them less. This will actually give them extra life, while giving you less laundry to wash.
My husband exemplifies Principle 2. He washes his jeans about every six months or so. I, on the other hand, wash some of my jeans after each wearing, and others of them after 2 or 3 wearings. This alone reduces our laundry significantly.
One item I don’t wash often is my hoodies. I find that washing them often takes away that soft feeling. Instead, I put them back on their hanger almost as soon as I take them off. Beyond reducing the laundry, it saves the sweater! Such a win-win.
Principle 3: Consider the journey your clothes must take from closet to closet. Once an item of clothing enters your home, trace what will happen to it — both when it gets dirty and after it gets cleaned. Consider the following questions:
Where do you put your dirty clothes when you are ready to wash them?
Where do you actually wash them?
What is the easiest path between where you put the dirty clothes and where you wash them? Consider ease of transport when answering this question. Do you need a basket, a bag or is the washer close enough that you might not need anything?
Finally, where do you store your clean clothes?
How do you get the clean clothes from the washer to your storage space?
Is there a way you can reduce the transportation distance?
Is there someone (like a child) you can ask to do the transport?
Principle 3 was created because I live in a FOURTH floor walk up building with laundry in the basement, which means my laundry room is FIVE FLOORS down (AND UP). It is a communal laundry room, so I can do multiple loads, but I also have to carry multiple loads down (AND UP) five flights. I traced the journey of my clothes from leaving the closet to returning to the closet, and I designed the following system:
STEP 1: Line the laundry baskets with a small laundry bag.
STEP 2: Take the small laundry bag from each laundry basket.
STEP 3: Put the small laundry bags into a bigger laundry bag that also has shoulder straps (TOTAL GAME CHANGER).
STEP 4: Wash each small bag’s laundry in a separate machine.
STEP 5: Put the laundry back in the bag it came from and then put all of the small bags back into the big bag.
STEP 6: Put each bag in the room that it belongs in.
STEP 7: Hang up the clothes.(…unless it is a rough week. Then they might lounge on their chair or night stand.)
Before I finish this, I’d like to offer up a radical idea (especially in the organizing world). You can be organized without folding your clothes. Let me say it again, with some emphasis.
You can be organized…
without folding your clothes.
In my home, I choose not to fold my toddler son’s clothes. They are small and easy to find. In this previous post, I share how I keep them organized into bins. I just don’t have time to fold them because he just opens the drawers and drags them around.
So, there you have it. I give you permission (as if you needed it) to buck the traditional or accepted standard because it works for you.
I hope these principles, guiding questions, and permission to do what works best for you along the way, help you on your laundry path.
With a bit of planning and forethought, laundry does not have to inundate our homes. Even in my fourth floor walk up, nearly every weekend, we complete our laundry with relative ease on a weekly basis. My exact system probably won’t work for you, but the principles, guiding questions, and the radical notion that folding is optional can help you find a system that will work for you.
Click here to get a guide that will help you develop your own laundry system.
