My Top Tips to Conquer the Laundry Monster

OVERCOMING THE LAUNDRY MONSTER

Laundry. laundry. laundry. Laundry. laundry. Laundry...etc...

Laundry is that never ending task that has been the nemesis of many a mother and housekeeper. I often say the state of my laundry is a direct reflection of the state of my mind.When the laundry baskets are overflowing that's when my mind feels completely overwhelmed, or when there is clean laundry scattered about in random places, perhaps half folded, waiting for eternity to return to their proper homes, that's when my mind is scattered and foggy. Conversely when I've conquered the laundry and I feel in control, I feel successful, productive and able to face my days with joy. Far too often the laundry is a major cause of my overwhelm, stress, depression, and feelings of failure. Do any of  you experience this too? So since laundry seems to affect me so profoundly, I've been on a mission to conquer this laundry monster and be in control. 

TOP TIPS TO CONQUER THE LAUNDRY

Its still a work in progress, but these things have radically improved the laundry situation in our home and my state of mind.

1. Make Less Laundry 

Now before you slam your computer closed, hear me out. Less is always more. Ok, well maybe not always, but certainly 95% of the time and definitely is the case when it comes to your laundry. But how do you make less laundry? Here is what works for us:

  - Wear clothes more than once.
           Really consider what you could wear or use more than once. My husband wears the same pair of work pants (he works in an office) for a week. In winter he is able to wear a dress shirt for 2 days. This saves a lot on laundry. We have a couple of hooks in our closet where he hangs his clothes when he takes them off. He then wears his "evening clothes" multiple days in a row too. Again using the hook. After all- he's only wearing these a couple of hours after work and they aren't really dirty after one use. I try to wear my clothes 2 days in a row. Its not always possible with 3 kids touching me all day and doesn't work great in summer, but makes a difference when I can. If you really can't stand the idea of wearing the same thing twice in a row try having two outfits to alternate for 4 days or switch up the accessories to change the look. This tip does not work for the kids.

- Have less clothes
        In my experience this makes a big difference to the laundry piles. If there are less clothes, the laundry simply can't get as overwhelming. I found this especially to be the case with the kids' clothes. Certainly less clothes for them to make dirty in a day! I recommend counting out just enough clothes to last your laundry cycle and packing everything else into a box and putting it up high in the closet. This way if you find you do need something in particular you can get it out and its a great way to see if it makes a difference to you without having to get rid of things you are worried you might need.


- Reuse Towels 

      Growing up in the USA, we always had a dryer and hence we only used our towels once and my incredible mother would miraculously wash them and they would reappear soft and clean and dry for us to use again. Here in Australia dryers are a much more rare commodity and with electricity prices some of the highest in the world, most people reuse their towels. I promise you will find that it is ok- you will survive and your laundry pile will be reduced a ton. I recommend you either just pop each person's towel in their wash load or have a day to do all the towels together (see next point for more details).


2. Eliminate Sorting 

It is absolutely possible. Do you seriously know how much time you waste sorting laundry?! I got this idea from Real Mom Real Solutions on YouTube. You can check out the video here .
What this looks like for us is basically we give each person in your family their own laundry basket and we never mix laundry. Then once a week give each person has laundry day and I wash their load that day. I mostly use a clothes line or clothes horse and try to hang like things together and sometimes I fold straight into the basket.  Once it's washed and dried, I pop it in the basket take it straight to the appropriate room and fold it (if I haven't already) straight into their dresser or closet. This has eliminated clean laundry basket lying around or piles of clean laundry on the spare bed or folded laundry that needs to be taken in 6 different directions around the house. I do separate out whites and dedicates as I put things into the laundry so I haven't quite eliminated the sorting with those loads but this method saves me tons of time and makes so much more sense to my brain.

My two girls laundry is a slight exception as they are actually so close in size that they share clothes and so it all goes in together. The girls are responsible to do their own laundry. I have found that to keep it manageable for them and so it can fit on their small clothes line, they do a load laundry every day Sun-Friday. They use the Real Mom Real Solutions technique and don't fold either.


3.Use Konmarie Folding and Storage 

 For the clothes that you decide you want to fold, I would highly recommend you consider using the Konmarie or Marie Kondo method of folding and story clothes and clothes in drawers. This has especially completely transformed my dishtowel drawer and my 1 year old's baby clothes! You can find heaps of videos on YouTube.

My kitchen cloth drawer

4. Make it Routine

Make laundry a daily part of your routine. Try attaching tasks to things that you already do consistently everyday. For example, if you brush your teeth every evening consider putting a load in the washer (if you have one, use the delay timer so the load will be done when you wake up) during or right before you brush your teeth. You could even put a reminder on your bathroom mirror! Then maybe you make a coffee every morning, you could add popping the clean wet wash into the dryer or onto the line before you start the coffee. Then if you work away from home you set the laundry basket by the front door where you come home after work and when you walk in the door straight away grab up the basket and get your now dry laundry. As you go to change from your work clothes take the basket with you and pop everything it in the closet or dresser. As a stay at home mom, maybe put a reminder in your phone or make bringing in and putting away the laundry what you do straight after the baby goes down for a nap or your husband gets home from work. Do you see how if you attach your laundry routine to things you already consistently do you are more likely to do it?

5. Free Your Mind 

Be conscious of how you let yourself talk about laundry. Work to keep your thoughts positive. Catch yourself when you start to say "I hate laundry" and turn it to "I am grateful we have clothes to wear" or "I like providing my family with clean clothing." I also found I had to accept that their is always going to be some laundry dirty somewhere, even if its only what we are wearing. When I stopped trying to have it all done at once, which the above method helped me enormously with, I started to feel a lot more peaceful around the laundry room.

                                        6. Get Help

 If you find yourself in a place where the laundry has become completely overwhelming and you don't feel you can face it, get help. Ask a friend, an older lady, your mom. Even consider hiring someone. It will be worth it and everyone knows that laundry can get out of hand so don't be embarrassed just do what you need to to get it back to a point where you can mentally and physically handle it.

GIVE IT TRY

So those are my top 6tips for conquering the laundry monster. Give them a go and let me know if they made a difference for you. Please share any great laundry tips you have found along the way-- I am always looking for more ideas! And let's spend more time playing with our kids or doing things that bring us joy and less time sorting laundry.