Now that life is back to normal (if that’s what you want to call it) I am blogging again.  I’m doing a happy sigh right now.        (sigh)          I like to write. 

So where were we?  Oh yes, the ever so dreadful laundry.

I have learned a few things over the course of doing the laundry for a family of six.  Things like: 

~  Don’t buy dry clean only clothes, it’s not worth the time or money.

~  Treat a stain with RESOLVE MAX™ Stain Stick^® and forget about it.  (See previous post  http://www.triedandtruemommy.com/2009/10/stick-it-to-stains/comment-page-1/#comment-37)

~  Have separate laundry baskets for whites and darks and put your clothes in the appropriate baskets as you take them off at night.  Tah-dah, no sorting on laundry day!

~  If it has to be ironed wait to iron it till you’re about to put it on.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to stand there for an hour and iron all of my hubby’s “office” shirts when it only takes him two minuets extra in the morning to iron one himself.  And, save yourself some money by not having them dry cleaned.

~  Don’t buy anything that has a tag on it warning you that the colors will bleed.  No red shirt is worth turning your son’s socks pink!  I have heard of Shout® Color Catcher® sheets that stop colors from bleeding (see the link on the left of my page for more info).  Some people swear by them but I’ve personally never tried them.  Why?  Well . . . one, I’m too cheap to buy them, and two, it’s just not worth the worry in the first place.  Which brings me to the KISS Principle.

~  Above all follow the KISS principle:  Keep It Simple Stupid.  You have enough to think about and fret over in a day; don’t make laundry part of it.

In my next post I’ll tell you how my kids do their own laundry with only a tiny bit of help from me.  Yes, my four year old does his own laundry!

Laundry is just one of those chores that I really can’t stand because it’s never truly finished.  As long as my family is wearing clothes, there’s dirty laundry.  Not that my kids wouldn’t love to run around naked on laundry day, I just don’t think anyone would want me to join them.  So I got to thinking, besides going around in my birthday suit, how could I make doing the laundry more fun and enjoyable?  And here’s what I’ve come up with thus far:

First things first; limiting the amount of clothing you have.

When I was a kid I remember a time when my mother was out-of-town and my Dad had completely run out of clean underwear.  So instead of washing a load of laundry he simply went to the store and bought more underwear.  Lovely, I know.

No matter how much clothing you have, whether its one week or a whole months worth, you still end up doing the same amount of laundry.  One load once a week or four loads once a month, it’s still all the same.

When it comes to my kids they each have about 10 to 11 outfits for the week.  That’s seven to wear during the week, two for back-up, especially when they are playing outside a lot in the summer getting dirty and/or wet, and one or two church outfits (they never stay in them all day).  You may need more or less depending on your child and their rate of messiness.  I’ve found that a limited number of clothing forces my kids to really wear what they have and it is very manageable for them when they have to put their laundry away (that’s a blog post to come).

Limiting the amount of clothing my kids have has really helped with our family budget too.  Little girl clothes are so cute and I would buy tons of them if I could, but I know if I buy one outfit, another one would have to go.  Did I mention it also keeps us very organized?  My two boys share a closet and so do my two girls and there’s not a whole lot of room for tons of clothing.  Keeping the clothes to a specific number keeps their closets from getting crowded, messy and overwhelming, and makes doing laundry once a week a no brainer.

What really got me thinking about all of this laundry was my sister-in-law Sarah.  She recently went to a Bosch event in Arizona and had the opportunity to check out the latest and greatest in laundry.  She came back with a laundry load of tips and tricks.  You can check them out at: http://www.organizedmom.net/?page_id=108