If you’ve got kids, you know that laundry can quickly take over your time and your house! It drove me crazy that there was constantly laundry ALL.OVER.THE.HOUSE. ALL.THE.TIME. I wish I could tell you that there is a magical laundry fairy that comes, but that isn’t going to happen unless you pay one! (I have done this, too, also a VERY good idea!) I hope these laundry tips help you as well!
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Tip 1- Assess if you need as much clothing as you have.
- This one has been monumental for me! My kids get TONS of hand-me-downs from family members (for which I am forever grateful- saved us tons of money) but it was getting to the point they simply had too many clothes. Guess what, if they have 12 pairs of shorts, all 12 will end up in the laundry by the end of the week! My son is notorious for changing several times a day (we’re also putting a stop to that), but now there aren’t as many clothes for him!
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Tip 2- Assign each room a day
- This is a very new tip for us, but it’s working well. Our 2 boys share a room, and I do all their laundry on Wednesdays. Landon (age 9) is responsible for bringing it down. I wash, dry and fold it, and at the end of the day, he puts it back up. I do mine and Ben’s one day, Allie’s one another, and Evie’s on yet another day. This saves TONS of time on sorting
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Tip 3- Stay on top of it.
- Similar to tip 2, I do a load every single day. (Except Sundays, I take this day off!) Doing a load (or 2) each day helps me from getting overwhelmed.
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Tip 4 – Fold your clothes in your laundry room.
- This one is my new favorite. Put a “folding table” in your laundry room. I know that all laundry rooms don’t have room for this, but if you can, it’s amazing! We recently (and by we, I mean my husband and a few friends) moved our deep freeze to the garage and out of the laundry room for this reason. When a load comes out of the dryer, I fold it immediately and either put it up or send it with one of the older children, who can then put it up. This way it’s not strewed all over the house while waiting to be folded. (If you don’t have room for a table, you can also use the top of your dryer! Good incentive to keep it cleaned off!)
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Tip 5- enlist use of little hands.
- While they may not fold perfectly at first (or ever!), use your kids to help you, especially with their own clothes and towels. I’m starting to teach my kids to run the washer and dryer as well. Just not ready to turn them completely loose yet. 🙂
What laundry tips would you add? I’m always up for new advice!
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About Kelli Hays
I am getting better at this. I particularly like tip #1. At first I felt bad that my kids wear the same thing over and over. But if it’s comfy, they like it, and it’s clean I’ve decided that’s what matters! Plus, since they will outgrow it soon anyway, I don’t need to spend lots of money buying clothes that rarely get worn.
I know. My kids had hordes of clothes but wore the same things over and over anyway. After I’ve purged, I don’t even remember what we’re missing! ha!
Great tips! Laundry never ends at our house, I feel like I’m never caught up!
I never feel caught up either! But with this system at least I’m not *completely* overwhelmed! (most days anyway!)
we don’t have a dryer so folding in the laundry would be senseless (I’d have to lug it all back through the house 2x) however, on days when I have the time and the weather is on my side, folding directly from the clothes line is a great time saver. I used to have an extra table devoted to laundry, this was great but not now 🙁
Another tip is wash over night, that way you have a load ready to hang first thing in the morning and you can make the most of the daylight hours.
Oh I really would love a clothesline! Folding directly from the line sounds lovely. I like your tip about washing overnight, too! Great idea!
Thanks for stopping by. 🙂
What great tips! I definitely need to try these. Thanks!
Thank you so much!
Great tips Kelli, thank you. My favourite laundry tip is to hang all clothes onto hangers and put this out on the line. It is amazing how much less ironing there is and putting clothes away is super quick.
Not sure if this counts as a laundry tip, but I gave up sorting socks. All the kids wear the same size socks (for now) so they all get dumped in one drawer. If any of them feel like having matching socks they are free to go digging! Saved me tons of time. Besides, mismatched socks are in these days.
My biggest time saver was doing away with traditional dressers for my 4 little ones. They have larger, heavy duty 3 drawer plastic organizers. The tubs have handles and can come out. They have one drawer each for socks/underwear/swim suits, tops, and bottoms. If their clothes don’t all fit, then it’s time to purge. I don’t fold for them anymore either. It wasn’t worth it to get upset when they went rummaging and messed it all up. Now even the younger ones can sort and put away their own clothes!
I also used to have just one hamper in the bathroom for all 4 kiddos. I would do their laundry together, then dump it on the couch to sort (my laundry area also is my homeschool storage, so I lost my folding area). It was a mess and just not working anymore. Now I have a separate hamper for boys and girls so I can wash them together then take the clothes directly to their rooms (they are split 2 boys, 2 girls and share rooms). It has made it that much easier!
Oh, and don’t tell my mom, but I don’t sort much for them either. I grew up with reds, darks, lights, whites, and delicates. I used to sort that much when I was first married, but now that there is so many clothes I pretty much do lights and darks 😉 And some days that’s a stretch, ha!