Do you have multiple laundry hampers in your room or in the laundry room? How do you ensure that it gets done properly? How do you separate the washes?
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@Freckles: One hamper with multiple compartments, light, dark and delicate. I round up the sheets and towels when I am ready to wash them and kitchen rages go in a bucket. I fold and put away as soon as it is done. Keeping in mind that I don't have any LO's
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It's just the two of us right now so we just have one hamper. It pretty much fills up once a week so I do laundry once a week, plus towels/sheets.
When LO gets here she'll have a separate hamper and I guess I'll just check both hampers weekly?
I don't really separate anything right now...
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System?
Uhh. We've got like 5 laundry baskets that mysteriously get full all at once. Then we scramble and do laundry, we don't even bother to sort, and swear under our breath that we will never let laundry pile up.
Then it happens again and again.
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DH and I have a hamper. We only have room for a small one in the laundry room. We have a door from our closet into the laundry room, so we just pass through the dirty clothes that way.
R has on in her room. I wash her stuff together once a week.
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I haul down all the dirty laundry and sort it in the laundry room
Towels
Sheets
Kids stuff
DH's stuff
My stuff
I wash DH's stuff separately because he likes all kinds of smelly detergents on his clothes and I prefer a lighter scent
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@Mrs. Jump Rope: YES.
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I have 4 laundry baskets in our closet/room: lights, darks, towels, baby stuff. I just do each one as it gets full. Sheets get washed every other week or so, but we only have one set right now so I just wash in the morning and make in the afternoon. Cloth diapers get washed and hung to dry every night.
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Each member of our family has their own basket. I do DD1's laundry every Sunday (bc her daycare blanket needs to be washed weekly so I just do hers together), and I do everyone else's laundry whenever the baskets get full. I rarely separate my laundry because I don't have a lot of stark white things anyway. If DH needs his laundry to be separated then he has to do the separating himself
I'll do his laundry but don't give me extra work!
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We have three laundry baskets. One is usually full of dirty clothes and the other two are usually full of clothes that we need to fold/hang up. I usually separate them by colors (darks, whites, colors, etc.) but usually wash sheets with sheets and towels with towels. I try to wash once a week. You'd think that there were four people living here instead of two.
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We have one hamper with two compartments - light and dark. We wash everything on the weekends. I just round up all the towels on laundry day so they don't take up space in the hamper and get washed as their own load. I never separate my delicates - whoops!
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I have a basket, DH has a basket, and E has a basket. He does his stuff, I do mine, and whoever is free does the baby's stuff, towels, and diapers.
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DH has a hamper, I have a basket, and the towels, sheets, blankets, etc get thrown in a pile in the laundry room LOL
I then separate dh's clothes - darks, whites, and jeans. three loads for him. 1 for all my clothes (I don't really own anything white and if I do happen to wear my one white shirt I'll throw it in his load). And then I do towels, sheets, etc as necessary.
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Laundry baskets that I sort. One in LOs room, 1 hamper in our room, and towels go in a basket. I sort before doing laundry since I'm the one who only does it.
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When I was pregnant I had a 2 baskets in LO's closet for her lights and darks but found that her stuff was so small and I had barely enough laundry for a load at a time so I just ended up ditching that while she's little and her laundry just goes in with ours and we use gentle detergent for the entire family. When she gets older I'll go back to a 2 basket system in her closer
We have a laundry organizer thing from Walmart that was so cheap but it's my favorite thing ever. It has 3 mesh bags that hang open like baskets and 2 are white mesh bags and one is a blue mesh bag...they are big too. So darks go in the blue mesh bag and whites go in a white mesh bag. DH's dry cleaning stuff (work shirts and pants) go in the other mesh bag. I probably do 2-3 loads a week - whites, darks and towels or sheets. I love that I can just grab the mesh bag and close it and carry it to the laundry room and dump the clothes in the washing machine.
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@Freckles: We have four laundry baskets in our bedroom (e.g., lights, darks, delicates and towels). I try to do laundry early on Friday evening (like right when I get home from work). I try to get everything done, folded, and put away so I can enjoy the weekend!
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we have two hampers, though we need to downsize to one because we don't have the space!
i do laundry at least twice a week, min 3 loads at a time (we live in an apt and don't have our own machines). i wash colors and whites separately, but things like grays and towels can go in either one depending on which load is less full!
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@blackbird: we have the same system! We both like doing our own laundry.
We do let things pile up though and end up doing a few loads at once. We are also pretty negligent at doing sheets and towels as terrible as that is. LO's laundry is done more frequently, but it's fun to do her stuff!
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1 basket that I separate into 2 piles on laundry day
Pile 1 = towels (towel setting)
Pile 2 = everything else, but I check if things need to be hung to dry or dryer (cold water gentle cycleI do 2-3 loads every weekend.
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We have one dirty hamper. I need to get a "clean" hamper or laundry basket as well! We do laundry daily- pretty convenient because it is in french doors at the end of the open concept kitchen/dining/living room. We just throw it all together. We have to do it constantly because we don't have that many clothes... I actually really dislike the front loaders, I hate to say. It is just really.hard. to bend and reach (?) I can barely reach the back of ours! And it gets funky. Still grateful it is in my kitchen! Sure beats down the hall or at the laundromat.
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DH does the laundry and we currently have the slowest. HE. washer/dryer. in. the. world. The wash cycle takes like 70 minutes and the dryer SUCKS. It takes two 90 minute cycles to get things completely dry. Towels? 3 turns in the dryer. So our laundry is always piled up.
We have 3 hampers. Towels, dark, white. We try to hang our bath towels and reuse them once or twice before washing them. Hand towels get thrown into the hamper every few days, as do kitchen towels. Once a month we do bed linens, but we have multiple sets of sheets so its not a big deal if there's a giant mound heaped in a corner.
If we're too busy and our laundry pile up is too big, I admit we throw everything into the car and go to the laundromat. This happens once every other month? DH works from home so he tries to run a load every day to keep up, but he forgets sometimes.
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We have a basket in the bathroom for all kid stuff and a hamper in our room for all our stuff. And a hamper in the hall for our linens.
I do the kids laundry (one big load) on Thursdays and Sundays.
Our laundry gets done about every two weeks. On the day I do it (usually a Saturday) I separate into whites, darks, and cold wash.
I wash our linens when u have enough for a full load, usually once a month. Again, on a Saturday when I'm not doing our clothes laundry. I have enough sets of sheets and towels to be able to put it off a week or two if I need.
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@sandy: I have the same one! We recently upgraded to a more sturdy one with canvas bags and a metal frame. We used our original one for years and years though!
I wash our laundry separately by person and by type (whites, darks, undies). I typically do 2-3 loads per weekend and 1 during the week. I don't have a lot of whites so it's really just dark or undies. I wash linens and sheets once a month or so because we have enough to just let them pile up in the laundry room.
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I don't have much of a system. Everyone has a hamper in their rooms (DH and I share) and I wash a load or two of laundry every day, depending on who needs what. It's never ending.
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I have a rolling laundry cart with three compartments: white, light, dark. I also have a separate laundry basket for drycleaning and hand wash articles.
I no longer separate by person. My son actually has the grodiest clothes, lol, but they get washed separately from our work clothes, for example.
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We have 3 hampers in the laundry room - one for lights, one for darks, and one for dry clean/delicates. The baby has a separate hamper in his room, and his laundry is done separate as well.
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@mrs. wagon: @blackbird: @Rubies: @Mamaof2: If you do kids' clothes separately, do you combine everything (dark/lights) and do one type of cycle (i.e., warm/cold/hot)? When LO was a baby, i'd mix it all together in the hot cycle (since we had diapers to wash as well), but i separate her stuff out now.
I think i have to go back to our old system of multiple baskets. DH did the laundry last week and ended up warm-washing my dry-clean only sweaters and pants, as well as our bar stool covers.
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@Freckles: the kids' clothes don't get separated...ain't nobody got time for that. In, dryer, out, done.
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@Rubies: LOL, i think the older i get, the more anal i am. So do you put everything in warm or cold wash?
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DH and I have separate hampers in our room - he has one where he combines everything (he separates at the time of washing), I have two separate ones for lights and darks. There is a hamper in the baby's room and all his clothes/towels/burp cloths, etc. I do my laundry and usually the baby's. @Freckles: When I do the baby's stuff, it all gets combined and I wash on warm. Most of his stuff is pretty colorfast, and I've never had an issue with darks/lights.
Towels generally get thrown in front of the washer and when they pile up, one of us washes them. But we're moving next week and the washer and dryer will not be in the bathroom any more and there won't be space in front of them to throw things, so we'll have to come up with a new system for those. Maybe I'll put a hamper in the bathroom too. Although then I could see never remembering to wash them because it's kind of hidden and running out of towels.
ETA: my husband has many talents, but laundry is not one of them, which is why I like to keep my stuff separate from his. I generally only trust him with towels, and his own stuff lol.
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@Freckles: Everything goes into warm wash/cold rinse.
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LO has a hamper in his room. In our room, we have two hampers, one for each of us. Usually the dirties go in one bin while cleans/folded goes in another. Today's laundry day for me.
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For the house we have 3 hampers
-Towels
-LO's
-Mine & DH'sI wash towels whenever we run out
and clothes when the hamper gets full. I used to sort them into 10 million loads of whites, blacks, towels, jeans, lights and then colors.Now I sort it into
-Towels
-Jeans
-ClothesDo back to back loads one day or do a load or two a day and then throw them in a heap on my bed and fold laundry once LO goes to bed & catch up on my reality TV
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@freckles, I never separate my darks and lights. I wash everything on cold. Never had problems. Honestly, if I have a small load, or if DH does, we dump E's clothes in with ours, too. I never saw the point in all the sorting. It just makes for extra work, IMO
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@Freckles: I do the kids' clothes on cold wash every time. I pretreat stains with spray and if something needs a really good cleaning I'll do a hot water oxiclean soak. But I'm paranoid about ruining an outfit with colors running. If I have a new piece of clothing that's brightly colored, I'll almost always use a shout color catcher sheet... and if it's going into an oxiclean soak for the first time, I soak it alone with nothing else.
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@mrs. wagon: Is it sad that i never heard of pre-treating stains until two months ago? So i read that if you do the stain treatment, you have to do it in a warm cycle rinse - is that true or does it come out fine in cold water?
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We currently do laundry every 3 weeks (about 4 loads in one day), so I know we're in for a big change once LO arrives in the fall! Our usual 4 loads are:
-towels/sheets
- lights
- darks
- darksThe only thing I'm anal about is that we have a separate "clean" hamper. I can't bear the idea of putting the fresh laundry from the dryer into the same "dirty" hamper that held all the unwashed clothes, haha. DH used to think I was crazy, but he now subscribes to this idea as well
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@Freckles: I never pre-treated stains before either!! Just tried to with putting more detergent. Now I pre-treat as soon as the item comes off the body, which means I usually get it very freshly. Sometimes it doesn't fully come out in a cold wash, so at that point I do a pre-treat and then a HOT oxiclean soak overnight. That almost always does the trick.
But for the most part, if I get it while it's fresh, and then it goes through a cold wash a few days later, it comes out. For food, paint, markers, blood, etc. I keep several bottles of oxi clean spray everywhere-- one right by the kids' hamper in the bathroom (so as I place items in, I examine for stains and then shoot them-- takes literally 2 seconds per item of clothing), one by our hamper in our bedroom, and one right above the washing machine.
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Right now my husband has a hamper (that also gets things like towels and sheets) and I have a separate one. We throw everything together! Don't separate anything (whites, reds, darks, towels, it all gets washed together). We do wash in cold water though. And then it sits in the dryer til we need it
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@Meridian: Every 3 weeks!! I hope you mean days because then i'm awfully jealous as to how much clothing you have!!
@mrs. wagon: Most of our laundry stuff is still in boxes, but i'll have to dig it out soon - LO's clothing have all of these stains that refuse to come out.
I'll do his laundry but don't give me extra work!
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