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Twin Cities Mom Collective

I Broke up with My Laundry

I Broke up with My Laundry | Twin Cities Moms Blog

Laundry is my number one nemesis as a mom.  It’s just the most overwhelming, tedious and time-consuming thing that controls my life.  I absolutely hate it.  Yes, I do have the right to use the H word.  With three boys, a husband, and me, who has the most clothes of them all, the amount of clothes we have is just massive. In a perfect world, I would be home for the entire sort, wash, dry, fold and put away routine but I am a busy mom who works part-time (and opposite shift of my husband). My time at home is spent doing stuff for and with my boys; so that dream routine NEVER happens.  

The dream routine that I would love to have turned into baskets and baskets of clothes on my living room floor, unsorted, wrinkled and was the centerpiece of my living room. When your kids dump out the baskets and turn them into a crash pad, you know you have an issue. My husband, bless his heart, just keeps putting loads of loads of clothes in the wash and dryer but that’s where his laundry chore stops. I’m left to fold and put away multiple baskets of clothes and I completely shut down. My kids can’t find any other their clothes, no one can find matching socks and while looking for them more clothes get thrown around adding to the chaos.  After years of clothes in my living room, something needed to change.  I searched around for ideas online and found one that caught my eye.  I decided it was time to break up with my laundry and find some order in all the clothes chaos. 

Now, that doesn’t mean I stopped doing laundry all together but I needed a new laundry idea to reduce my stress, my families stress and my house’s mess.  So I’ve broken up with the classic laundry routine! Goodbye hours and hours of folding and putting away clothes.  Hello to this mom has less stress, house ain’t a mess and kids still can get dressed!

I do have a separate laundry room on the main level.  It is quite nice but it’s narrow so there’s not a ton of space for something big.  I found an idea online that involved putting a tiered wire rack in the laundry area.  A laundry basket fits entirely in each tier and there is enough room for an additional little basket.  I have five people in my family and found a five-tiered wire rack so …BOOM each person has a basket on this rack! 

My new laundry routine is sort, wash, dry and put in a basket. Every person’s clothes go into their basket nicely (not scrunched in a ball).  Each person also has a smaller basket on the side for their undergarments. We may fetch our clothes from this daily, in search of an item that just got washed. This is how our family is handling laundry while we the parents are at work, the kids are at sports or speech, or our family is making memories that have nothing to do with laundry. It feels like the weight has been lifted off on my shoulders from the pressure to do laundry from start to finish.  I am so content with this new way for our family and everyone is on board.

I Broke up with My Laundry | Twin Cities Moms Blog

I Broke up with My Laundry | Twin Cities Moms Blog

Now some questions you have about my family’s new laundry routine:

  1. Do you ever fold or put away clothes?
    • Yes, once in a while I will fold and put away clothes during my free time.  Sometimes you know you just get in the supermom clean mode? Good chance I’ll do it then. 
  2. Aren’t your clothes wrinkly?
    • Yes, sometimes they do get wrinkly, depending on who put them in the basket.  A few minutes in the dryer helps to get the wrinkles out.  
  3. What about the clothes that need to be hung up?
    • Luckily the wired tiered racks are excellent for hanging clothes. We keep a few hangers on it as well. Then they’ll eventually get to our closets.
  4. Do your kids use their drawers or have a dresser if all their clothes are in their basket? Do they like the way you now do laundry?
    • Yes, they do still have a dresser.  When one of us hasn’t done a huge fold and put away, their drawers are used for their Pokémon cards or Legos.  My kids now know to come to their basket to look for certain clothes they want to wear.  Once they get old enough, they will also have the opportunity to take their own basket, fold and put away the clothes.  As they are getting older, that task will soon be happening.  No one seems to mind this new routine as at least all his or her stuff is in one space. No more digging in multiple baskets to find that one favorite shirt!
  5. Once your kids are all in school, will you go back to the old way of doing laundry?
    • I have one or two years left until all my kids are in school full time.  Depending on my life, my work or the goals I am working on, I don’t think I’ll take down my tiered rack anytime soon.  Life will only get busier with three boys and their sports, activities, and friends.  With my newly well-deserved free time, do I want to be doing laundry or doing something I love?

I am loving my newly cleaned house and having the clothes in a designated spot,. I love the extra time I now have to do the things I love and to make memories with my family.  Now I no longer fear or dread doing the laundry.  I was tired of facing that fear and dread every day so I decided to do something about it. This has by far been my most favorite and desperately needed mom hack.  So see ya laundry, maybe I’ll see you again in about 18 years. 

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1 comment

Amanda August 15, 2018 at 10:17 PM

I wish my “laundry room” wasn’t a dark creepy damp basement. My living room is also a storage place for baskets and baskets of clothes, and I don’t even work outside the home part time. My husband does work up to 100 hours a week pretty regularly though.

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