I love talking about those little routine parts of our lives that we all do so differently. That’s why I wrote a two-part series on sleep. And have discussed my showering routine. Today, we’re going to talk about laundry.
The way I do laundry is going to be vastly, vastly different from the way other people do laundry because I am a single lady with no kids so I only have to worry about my own laundry. Which is very, very nice! So let’s dig into this topic.
How often I do laundry
In the past, my “tell” for when it was time to do laundry was when I was down to just a few pairs of underwear. But things changed when I moved into my current apartment because of my washer. The basin is so very tiny that I cannot do a regular load of clothes anymore. It was hard for me to gauge when I had enough laundry for a full load (usually, I had too much laundry) so now I use the basin as my laundry basket. Yep! Rather than sticking dirty clothes into a regular laundry basket that I keep in my bedroom or bathroom, everything goes right into the washer. Once the basin is nearly full, I will add in some other items – like my current pajamas, the lounge clothes I’ve been wearing around, etc. – and then pop in a Tide pod and go. Typically, I do one load of laundry every 7-10 days.
Separating laundry
Want to know one of my controversial opinions? I don’t believe in separating laundry by color. White shorts, black shirts, bright pink sports bras? It all goes into one load! And everything washes just fine! I have been doing my laundry this way for years and have never had an issue. So I do not do separate loads for my whites and my darks.
The types of laundry I do
There are five types of laundry I do regularly:
- Clothes – Like I said above, I do not separate my clothing into whites and darks. I do one full load of clothing every 7-10 days.
- Towels/washcloths – I do a separate load of towels, washcloths, and reusable cotton rounds. (I use washcloths + cotton rounds twice/daily for my skincare routine.) During this cycle, I will also throw in the hand towel I use in the bathroom, any kitchen towels I’ve been using, the towel wrap I use for my hair after a shower, and sometimes the mopping pad I used when cleaning my floors.
- Bedding – I wash my pillowcases and fitted sheet.
- Bras – I have two nice bras that I wash separately from the other clothes, on a delicate cycle.
- Quilt – My apartment washer/dryer is not big enough to wash my quilt effectively, so I bring it to my mom’s to wash.
My laundry system
Here’s how my laundry process works:
Washing
- Once I have filled up the washer basin with clothes that need to be washed, I will start a load.
- After the clothes are done and transferred to the dryer, I’ll either do a load of towels/washcloths or bedding. I usually alternate which one I do. If I’m running low on washcloths, then I do towels/washcloths. If not, I’ll do my bedding. (I’m usually only washing my bedding on a monthly basis. IT SHOULD BE MORE OFTEN. I know that. I just can’t get into the habit of doing so.)
- If it’s time to wash my bras, I’ll do a delicate cycle for them after my second load of laundry and then let them air dry.
Drying
- I am particular about what clothes I allow into the dryer. All of my underwear, jeans/pants/shorts, sports bras, bralettes, and socks go into the dryer. For shirts, most get hung up to air dry (even some of my workout shirts if they are on the smaller side). I have a lot of cotton tees that will go in the dryer, especially if they are big on me. I take care of my dryer by hiring dryer vent cleaning services regularly. Dresses are air-dried. (To airdry, I just hang up the shirt/dress on a hanger and hang it on a shelf in my closet. I have wire shelving in my walk-in closet, so it’s easy to hang things from there.)
- All towels, washcloths, cotton rounds, mopping pads, and bedding goes straight into the dryer.
Folding/Putting Away
I am okay at folding/putting away my laundry in a timely manner. There are some days when the last load will be in the dryer overnight if I’m tired. But usually, I put on a podcast and fold laundry on my kitchen table and it’s not a huge deal. It helps that it’s only my laundry I’m dealing with!
Laundry products I use
I’m not fancy with my laundry and I suppose I could look into more eco-friendly products than what I currently use, but it’s not something I have researched. Currently, I use Tide pods (I get the really big container that usually lasts me 8-10 months). I use the Tide 4-in-1 Ultra Oxi pods for cleaning my clothes and Tide Hygienic Clean Power Pods for towels and bedding. For my bras, I use Woolite Delicates laundry detergent. I buy a small bottle, which lasts a pretty long time for me. I don’t use any sort of dryer sheets or dryer balls in the dryer. My mom swears by them, but I guess I don’t really understand what they do, other than making my clothes smell nice. It doesn’t seem necessary.
And that’s my laundry routine! I’d love to hear about what yours looks like, but please don’t tell me if you’re appalled at how many weeks I go between washing my bedding. I’m a work in progress, okay?!
I will not judge you, since I also only wash my bedding once a month too. It may be 3 weeks sometimes but I find it is more easy to keep track of if I do it at the same time every month, so the first weekend of the month, I do bedding, bathroom cleaning and floor mopping. Those things all may get done on an emergency basis but are otherwise once per month.
I also do not separate my colors from my whites; nothing I have is so special that it matters to me that much. I also put a tiny bit of bleach (like a capful) in every load, even if it is colors, as I feel it makes for fresher laundry plus my workout clothes can get pretty smelly. I hang dry my work clothes or anything that will dry fast, like my running windbreaker, rain jacket, scarf, beanie etc.
That’s a good tip for adding bleach to your laundry! I’m sure it really helps with the workout clothes.
I’m also grateful I’m not the only one who doesn’t wash my bedding as frequently as I should. Once a month seems fine, honestly!
It is so soothing and interesting to hear how others do these completely routine things we all do! I am very envious of your 7-10 day break between laundry sessions. We COULD go that long, because goodness knows we have way too many clothes. But our laundry baskets would overflow! Plus, I would run out of workout clothes pretty quickly and I wear those daily. I do probably 3-7 loads of laundry a week: 1-2 loads of dark clothes, 1-2 loads of lights, sometimes a load of whites if we have enough, a load of bedding and/or a load of towels. We are on a weekly schedule with bedding these days, but it took a lonnnnng time to get there; more commonly it was every two weeks. Towels I switch out weekly, but wash every two weeks if that makes sense. (We each have multiple towels.) I am the worst with delicate loads or clothing that requires special handling — sometimes they sit at the bottom of the laundry bin for weeks until I have enough things to feel like I can “justify” a gentle load. This includes bras, my hair towel, my satin pillowcase, and some other items I can’t think of now.
The worst for me is the FOLDING. UGH. I hate it so much. I have been on a roll these past few weeks of folding clothes a load at a time when they come out of the dryer. But sometimes I will just dump a clean, dry load on the guest bed… and then another and another… until it’s so overwhelming I just want to shut the door. Usually then I enlist my husband to help chip away at it! All three of us are responsible for putting away our own clothing, but I do 75% of the folding and 95% of the sorting/washing.
I think now that most detergents work in cold water, there’s no real reason to separate colors and lights unless you have some reason to think something will run. But my husband is a laundry purist, plus we have so much laundry it doesn’t add any work to sort them into different loads, so we continue to separate things.
I’m trying to think if I have any controversial laundry habits… Maybe the most controversial is that I REFUSE to use the amount of liquid detergent recommended by the bottle. That is WAY too much for clothing that is really just worn, not filthy. I put in a third of what I’m supposed to, maybe less.
I think if I had enough clothes to separate, I might do that but it would take me FOREVER to have a full load of lights/whites. I don’t have enough of those types of clothes myself.
I can see how the folding part of laundry would be so annoying and time-consuming when you’re doing so much laundry every week! That would really grind my gears, too.
Well…this was fun!
Some thoughts:
1) When the kids were little I used to get away with 1-2 loads/week. How did I do this? I swear each child seems to go through like a dozen outfits a day. Especially my son. He just gets…so dirty! Also, my kids hear “Clean up your room” to mean “Dump all the quasi-clean clothes on my floor into the laundry basket).
2) The joke is going to be on them, soon, because my daughter doesn’t know this yet, but one of her birthday presents this year is going to be a laundry basket and she is going to be responsible for washing her own clothes!)
3) Like you, I mix all my clothes (lights and darks). I also hang dry some items and recently got an IKEA hanging device that makes it easier to dry wool socks, my makeup removing clothes etc).
4) Like Suzanne I just eyeball the detergent and use WAYYY less than what it calls for.
5) I hate folding and putting laundry away. For me, this is 90% of the work of laundry. Starting a load – even moving it to the dryer – is easy. But then matching socks and folding things. Ugh, ugh, ugh. HATE THIS PART.
6) I still refuse to admit how often I change sheets, but I HAVE added some news layers of accountability so it should happen more frequently moving forward.
I loved when I got to start doing my own laundry as a kid, haha. But I will admit that I was sometimes very lazy about moving my clothes into the dryer and taking them out of the dryer, lol. I am excited to see how Abby does with her new laundry chore!
The folding has to be so very annoying when you’re folding clothes for an entire family! I totally understand that.
I am dumbfounded by the number of people who don’t separate their clothes by color. Dumbfounded . I have had one too many articles of clothing ruined by blue jeans and pink clothes. I am not on board with this insanity.
I am also not judging you for your sheet washing. We probably only wash ours every three or four weeks. I read somewhere that you’re supposed to wash sheets and pillowcases more than once a week if you have pets and I just laughed and laughed. Who’s doing that?!
I honestly do not have enough light-colored clothes to do a whole separate load, so that’s why I started combining them. It would take me forever to have enough lights to make a full load. And I wash clothes on cold, so maybe that helps? I dunno!
Every WEEK. No, no, no.
Every 7-10 days! I just finished folding my fourth load of the week! I’m just imagining how lovely a weekly load would be. I do separate out the whites, but you do you!
I live in such a dry climate that dryer sheets are a must, otherwise everything is staticky and sticks together!
I wash my sheets and pillowcases weekly, and duvet covers every couple of months, but obviously am not judging anyone else for their laundry situations!
Ohhhh, thanks for explaining the reason for dryer sheets! Like, logically I knew that, but I think it makes sense why I don’t feel the same need for them. Humid climate does have some perks, I guess? Haha.
Team Wash Everything Together!
I actually do my bedding reasonably frequently now, between kid bedwetting sometimes and all the dog fur.
I used to be very anti dryer but now I have one and can’t go back. So convenient and gets rid of all the pet hair/lint!
Oh my goodness, my dryer is a rockstar! I can’t imagine living without one. It’s so convenient!
I grew up in a household that separate laundry and did that until I moved in with Phil. We do not separate our laundry and it doesn’t seem to make a difference! We usually do 3 loads of laundry/week. I typically do the first load on Friday and then one more load on Saturday and Sunday. Our boys don’t have a ton of clothes so we have to do laundry about every 5 days or Will runs out of footie pjs (which is what he wears during our cold winter months). I don’t air dry much, though. I generally only air dry my sweaters. We don’t have much room to airdry things and nothing seems to be impacted by going in the dryer so I’d rather dry as much as I can!
Phil folds his own clothes and I fold mine and the boys. This gets done fairly soon after the clothes are dry and I put the clothes away right away. I am kind of particular about how the boys’ clothes get folded and put away in their drawers. But I am the person who is picking out their outfits for each day so I’m fine folding/putting away their laundry if it makes picking out outfits easier. I’m very particular about drawers being organized, though. I can not stand drawers full of unfolded clothes or if it looks like a drawer has been “rifled through.” I will let go of my need for order when the boys can pick out their own clothes!
I find it very interesting that you can get away with just 3 loads a week! It seems like other multi-person households have to do at least daily loads. But it probably has to be that way with your family since both you and Phil work full-time, mostly out of the home!
I do 3 loads A DAY. Sometimes more if I am changing sheets. Like yesterday was 2 kids’ sheets day, so I did my normal 3 loads and then 3 more for their bedding. I wash sheets (top too), blankets, and comforters on the weekly. FOR SEVEN BEDS. Oh, it’s so much laundry. We wash, fold, and out away EVERY SINGLE DAY.
The laundry upkeep for a big family has to be so crazy! One of my friends was talking about this to me – she has 3 kids and they HAVE to do at least a daily load or things get out of control that quickly.
I’m not sure why knowing how other people do their laundry is interesting, but it definitely is. I read a book a couple of years ago, ‘Laundry Love’, that said to sort your clothes by weight, not by color. We do a lot of laundry around here (considering there are only 3 of us), so I sort both ways. Heavy items, especially if they have a zipper or something that is going to be hard on other clothes, they go in with other heavy items, like the sweatpants my daughter has worn for an hour in the morning while getting ready for work, before putting them in the hamper. The book also suggested washing everything in the short cycle with warm water, so we do that. I bought some dryer balls, but I forget to use them…they were too loud when my husband was at home reporting traffic on the radio. Now that he’s in an office, I’ll bet I could use them again.
I’ve had a couple of casualties by mixing colors, whites turning pink or just dingy, so I don’t do that very often. We wash our sheets every week or two, but will you be horrified if I tell you that I don’t wash my clothes every time I wear them? Underwear and socks, yes. Sweaters and jeans, no way. I think we wash things too much just to freshen them up, not because they are dirty, and sometimes just being aired out will do that. (Clearly I have a desk job, and don’t do anything that gets me dirty.)
I have Laundry Love on my TBR list! I need to get around to reading it because I love reading books about mundane tasks and the “proper” way of doing things. I’m sure I would get a lot out of that book!
Oh, and your comment reminded me that I *also* wear clothes multiple times before washing them! No shame!
Don’t worry! I should also wash my bedding more often, but then none of us are getting rashes or any weird skin disorders, so it’s hard to find the motivation. I also don’t separate by colors- i wash everything on cold and it just doesn’t seem necessary.
I do a load of laundry almost every single day. I know. It’s insane. I can’t figure out where it all comes from. I do all the laundry for our family of four, but it still doesn’t seem like it should be that much. I’ve tried doing “clothing audits” – “How many shirts did you wear today? Did you take a brand new towel for your shower?” but I still can’t understand why there’s SO MUCH LAUNDRY. I’ve basically given up- it’s become a routine to throw a load in every night after dinner.
Doing a daily load of laundry seems to be the norm for families! There’s just so many more clothes and other items to contend with! And everyone has their own preferences for how often things should be washed.
I definitely don’t separate white and darks, unless I have something new that seems like it’s going to bleed (like a new red shirt or dark jeans, or something). I’ll wash those separately until I feel like they’re safe to blend.
But wow, every 7-10 days… I’m so jealous. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I don’t have kids, and I’m somehow doing laundry EVERY DAMN DAY.
The one thing I didn’t mention here is that I rewear a lot of clothes before putting them in the washer because I just don’t feel like doing laundry more frequently than I currently do, haha. Even sports bras get reworn, unless I’ve done a SUPER sweaty workout. Am I a gross human? Maybe.
That is smart to use your laundry basin to put the dirty clothes in! And I am not appalled at your sheets habit at all 🙂
We do laundry many times a week. I separate by street clothes, work out clothes, work clothes, delicates, and the household stuff you mentioned (sheets, towels, place settings). We use All liquid detergent and some of those eco friendly dryer sheets. I love doing laundry and put my stuff away quickly, unless I get busy and forget!
It is such a small laundry basin – it makes me sad, lol. I’m surprised I’m not doing laundry more often with how small my loads typically are!
This is so similar to my approach – well, with the exception of sheet-washing frequency. I do 2 loads of clothes/week + one load for workout clothes (they stink). I do the big towel wash + bedding together. And I do NOT separate colors. All cold water, for sure. And definitely not as much detergent. I am fascinated, though, that you can get the pods to disintegrate fully in your stacked w/d. Mine… leaves little bits of gel on my clothes, which, no. So liquid it is.
Oh, that’s so interesting! I’ve never had an issue with the pods not fully dissolving in water. Maybe our water sources are different? I really love using the pods, so it would make me sad to have to go back to liquid detergent, lol.
Love reading about others’ day-to-day routines… it’s so interesting how we all have the same chores but might approach them so differently. I think it’s so smart that you just “collect” your laundry in the washer until it’s full and then you run a load.
I’d say we do two loads per week (one color, one dark) and then sheets/towels and a load of whites every few weeks. Usually, Jon takes care of the laundry (I do the hanging up and folding). We started using the laundry detergent sheets and I really like them.