Cleaning & Organizing
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Laundry Method
I can NOT for the life of me find a good method to stay on top of the laundry. I always seem to find the time to throw the laundry in the wash but before I know it, I'm throwing a load in the dryer and taking the clean clothes out of the dryer and in the basket they sit. Our clothes are then clean but wrinkled and we can't ever find anything. I usually find time to fold them when the kids are napping but then I can't put anything away because they would wake up if I went in their rooms and then......it just sits there again. I was good about it until we had our 2nd little one in April and now I always feel behind. Does anyone have a good laundry method they can share? How many times a week do you do laundry? And when?
Re: Laundry Method
I'll start with one idea -
I do everyone's laundry separately. I keep it separate from the start so never any sorting out what belongs to who.
DH does his own, I do mine, and either one will do kids. And really, most things don't fade. My sister will make 16 piles of every different color. drives me nuts.
I do separate really blacks from towels, but then towels are a separate load. But to save money, I only dry towels half way and then hang them up on the towel bars again to air dry. Sheets go right back on the bed.
On your leavng things in the drier, maybe you could set a kitchen timer as a reminder to go check on it.
Maybe you could do one load a day. Yours one day, kids another, towels another, sheets another, DH whenever he decides. Just a thought so it doesn't become a burden and huge job.
I don't have a large family, but I just make a practice of folding everything right out of the dryer. My motto is, "If you handle it, handle it." Meaning, if I touch it once, I do everything that it needs before I put it in the basket (sort, fold, turn right-side out, zip, button, etc). So I take 5 minutes to fold everything as I take it out of the dryer. I grab one thing, fold it, put it in the basket, and so on. Things like socks get put on top of the dryer until their mate comes out. Then I take the basket to the bedroom, sort it, put my stuff away, put DH's stuff on his pillow, and put the basket away.
It takes me literally about 15 hands-on time to do a load of laundry start to finish. With 1/2 hour breaks in between two steps. LOL
Ditto the load a day. I only have one kid but I live on a farm. Laundry is my life if I don't stay on it.
I do one load a day, sometimes two. Baby clothes, barn clothes, towels,sheets, kitchen rags, whites. That's it and how I sort. I don't sort more than necessary and that saves me a ton of time and loads.
Also I keep the hangers in the laundry room. As stuff comes out of the dryer I hang it up and then I try to put it away ASAP. In your case you could probably sneak in kid rooms and hang it up then without waking rather than banging around in dresser drawers. Also hanging saves so much time and is more organized.
I stay at home, too...I make it a point to try to get one load of dirty laundry together at night and put it in a pile. The next morning while my coffee is making, I throw it in the wash. ASAP when I remember to, I put it in the dryer. Take it out and fold it in the afternoon or at least the next day.
As long as I do one load a day (M-F) it stays done. But sometimes I only do it 3-4 days a week and we're good.
I send my laundry to a wash and fold place so my issues are a bit different.
We pretreat and wrap it up Sunday night after the kids are asleep. I do 2 bags (kids, adults) to make it easier for me to put it away. DH drops it off on his way to work. I get it back on Tuesday.
When the laundry comes back I sort kids stuff when both kids are sleep. My daughter's stuff typcially gets done in the morning or maybe right after bath. She is awake and often watches, but some time she'll wander off. It doesn't take too long to be honest. With my son, we could put it away while he sleeps since he isn't to aware but usually me or the babysitter will do it when he's occupied on the mat or bouncer.
With our stuff, I usually do it whenever I need underware. Sometimes I'll ask DH to do it.