By reading this blog title you may assume I'm some laundry-sorting, stain-removing, super-organized laundry expert.
Well....you would be wrong! Actually, I've struggled with the laundry battle for years. One thing after another always lead to a mountain of laundry in my house:
I was sick during about half of all four of my pregnancies with severe morning sickness, sciatica pain, etc (that's about 16 months of being backed up on laundry).
Our home has constantly been under construction since the day we bought it. Little by little projects here and there and many of them interfering with daily routines and life; including laundry.
My washer breaking. Yeah, the water pump broke due to a baby sock getting sucked into it. All this time the dryer has been blamed for eating socks and it's the washer!
My dryer breaking more than once. The heating element burnt out because there was a clog in our vent hose we didn't know about. I had times where I had to carry wet laundry to the laundromat, and in the summer hang my laundry on the front porch to dry. Even when my dryer was working it took 2hrs for one small load to dry. Finally it's working the way it should!
Someday we would like to have one or two more children. So I store all the older kids clothes in bins in the attic to use as hand-me-downs someday. Every season and every time the kids out grow their clothes I'm swapping clothes from those bins in the attic. There were times I'd swap new clothes in but the old clothes never made it into the attic and ended up getting mixed in with dirty clothes piles and rewashed...ugh.
There were also a few times my little ones went through their dressers and threw clean clothes in with dirty laundry and I didn't realize it until they were already washed.
Add in a few sessions of everyone (including Mom) being sick and out for the count.
AND two boys who wet the bed almost every night (leading to a TON of bedding that needs washed)....
And there is my list ofreasons excuses.
All of these added up to this:
The Laundry Mountain of DOOM!
*hangs head shamefully*
Yes, this is a KING size bed that is COVERED with dirty laundry. I actually went out and bought 15 laundry baskets just to help me sort and organize and make some sense of this mess!
The process involved me organizing my attic and buying bins for all the clothes that are in storage, washing 4-5 loads of laundry (sometimes more) any day I could manage to do so.
I had many set backs but kept plugging away. I did what I could, when I could.
Now that I have finally overcome that mountain of laundry I'm working hard to keep it from piling up. Yes, I will ALWAYS have laundry to do and will still be washing laundry every day. But knowing I don't have a mountain of laundry to contend with and all my clean laundry is organized and put away is a huge relief and accomplishment!
My Laundry Schedule:
Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays:
1-2 Loads of Clothing
(depending on your family size you may need to do more)
Tuesdays:
Bedding
Thursdays:
Kitchen and Bath Towels
Saturdays (Once a Month):
Seasonal Items
(coats, hats, gloves, throws, couch pillows, curtains, tablecloths...anything extra that needs washed).
**All clean laundry will be put away the same day and not sit around in laundry baskets.**
**Sunday Nights, Tuesday Nights and Thursday Nights I will have the kids brings the clothes from the hampers downstairs and put the dirty laundry into the laundry cart baskets to be washed the next day.**
I hope this post encourages you that you CAN overcome that laundry mountain in your house; don't give up!
I was sick during about half of all four of my pregnancies with severe morning sickness, sciatica pain, etc (that's about 16 months of being backed up on laundry).
Our home has constantly been under construction since the day we bought it. Little by little projects here and there and many of them interfering with daily routines and life; including laundry.
My washer breaking. Yeah, the water pump broke due to a baby sock getting sucked into it. All this time the dryer has been blamed for eating socks and it's the washer!
My dryer breaking more than once. The heating element burnt out because there was a clog in our vent hose we didn't know about. I had times where I had to carry wet laundry to the laundromat, and in the summer hang my laundry on the front porch to dry. Even when my dryer was working it took 2hrs for one small load to dry. Finally it's working the way it should!
Someday we would like to have one or two more children. So I store all the older kids clothes in bins in the attic to use as hand-me-downs someday. Every season and every time the kids out grow their clothes I'm swapping clothes from those bins in the attic. There were times I'd swap new clothes in but the old clothes never made it into the attic and ended up getting mixed in with dirty clothes piles and rewashed...ugh.
There were also a few times my little ones went through their dressers and threw clean clothes in with dirty laundry and I didn't realize it until they were already washed.
Add in a few sessions of everyone (including Mom) being sick and out for the count.
AND two boys who wet the bed almost every night (leading to a TON of bedding that needs washed)....
And there is my list of
All of these added up to this:
The Laundry Mountain of DOOM!
Yes, this is a KING size bed that is COVERED with dirty laundry. I actually went out and bought 15 laundry baskets just to help me sort and organize and make some sense of this mess!
The process involved me organizing my attic and buying bins for all the clothes that are in storage, washing 4-5 loads of laundry (sometimes more) any day I could manage to do so.
I had many set backs but kept plugging away. I did what I could, when I could.
Now that I have finally overcome that mountain of laundry I'm working hard to keep it from piling up. Yes, I will ALWAYS have laundry to do and will still be washing laundry every day. But knowing I don't have a mountain of laundry to contend with and all my clean laundry is organized and put away is a huge relief and accomplishment!
My Laundry Schedule:
Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays:
1-2 Loads of Clothing
(depending on your family size you may need to do more)
Tuesdays:
Bedding
Thursdays:
Kitchen and Bath Towels
Saturdays (Once a Month):
Seasonal Items
(coats, hats, gloves, throws, couch pillows, curtains, tablecloths...anything extra that needs washed).
**All clean laundry will be put away the same day and not sit around in laundry baskets.**
**Sunday Nights, Tuesday Nights and Thursday Nights I will have the kids brings the clothes from the hampers downstairs and put the dirty laundry into the laundry cart baskets to be washed the next day.**
I hope this post encourages you that you CAN overcome that laundry mountain in your house; don't give up!
