Should undies and tea cloths be washed together?

[PeridotCricket]

I think not, DH, normally very particular...just chucks them all in together as a whites wash on 40.

[Mindchilder]

Surely unless you disinfect and sterilise your washing machine between uses, it doesn't matter if teatowels and pants are in the machine at the same time or one after the other?

[JellySlice]

disinfect and sterilise your washing machine between uses,

ROFPMSL!

Are you for real?

[Girlslikeme]

What a waste of water to wash things separately. I bung it all in together.

[SapphireSeptember]

I wash towels and bedding separately to my clothes (nothing to do with cleanliness, I just don't like the idea of heavy towels going in with a thin cotton skirt.) Everything gets washed at 40°C, including underwear which gets washed with all my other clothes. I do separate lights from darks and have a few clothes that I do on a handwash cycle. I don't own any tea towels, but I wouldn't wash them with clothes, they'd go in with the other towels. I also wash my work clothes separately, but that's because they stink (and I have bras and socks that I only wear for work.)

[Jeippinghmip]

Do people dry the their hands and faces on different towels to the one they dry their body on?

Good grief, of course I do. I personally don't want to dry my face on a towel that's just dried my bum.

[RomanyRoots]

Good grief no wonder our environment is suffering.

I do dark on a load, pales, brights and whites.
Whatever the item they go in on the appropriate load.

I'd never dream of washing on more than a 40% wash, unless necessary like heavily soiled.

Of course you use the same towel for your face as body, unless you can't be trusted to not stick the towel up your bum hole.

[Vintagegoth]

Had a housemate who would wash the tea towels with the bath mat, pedestal mat and the toilet mat together. Always off-putting when you find pubes on your tea towel.

[Pissedoffdotcom]

If you use a different towel for your face & body then i can sort of get why the idea of pants with other items freaks you out 😂

[SneakyGremlins]

See I live alone everything goes in on the 59 minute cycle at 60 degrees.

[SneakyGremlins]

Since I have nobody to moan that towels can only go with towels or so on, I meant to add

[mistermagpie]

Mumsnet has a 'thing' about bath mats as if they are germ infested things. I don't get it, my bathmat goes onto the (clean ish) floor and I step into it when I get out of the shower, with my clean feet. I then pick it up and put it on the radiator. What's so germy about that which renders it somehow wrong to wash it with say, my jeans, which have sat on bus seats, office chairs, park benches and the like?

[LeftRightCentre]

No, they shouldn't.

[MargaretDribble]

Yuck. Not in my house, but we're all different.

[BarbaraofSevillle]

What's so germy about that which renders it somehow wrong to wash it with say, my jeans, which have sat on bus seats, office chairs, park benches and the like

There was once a thread where the germophobes talked about stripping off outdoor clothes the second they entered the house to reduce the chance of 'outside' contaminating the inside of their house.

I couldn't help imagining air showers and tacky mats of the type you see when entering clean rooms in electronics factories or similar installed in their hallways.

[PeridotCricket]

You use different towels to dry your face and body.?...that had honestly never occurred to me.

[JellySlice]

There are very good reasons to wash towels separately from clothes.

1. To avoid using fabric conditioner on them. Fabric conditioner reduces absorbency.
   
   
2. To avoid damaging knit fabrics, like t-shirts or fleeces. The rougher texture of terry can make knit fabrics bobble.
   
   
3. To do a 90C service wash while still getting a load done. A 90C wash is likely to damage clothes made of, say, viscose, or containing elastic, whereas towels won't be.
   
   
4. To make up a load that's quick to peg out, if you're putting it on late and don't care about it being darked on.
   
   None of these reasons relate to contaminants

[Pissedoffdotcom]

PeridotCricket it's literally the only reason i can give for why people would get anal excuse the pun about tea towels & towels/rinsed nappies etc going together. If you don't use a different towel for your face, you're still wiping your bits with the same towel you dry your face with!

[dinosaurkisses]

I separate lights and darks, but aside from that everything gets bunged in together on a 30 or 40 degree wash, depending on the machine function. I'm not madly conscious abut the environment, but I am a bit about the waste of energy etc of very hot washes.

I love these threads for the variety- I'm still laughing at the last time there was one on how often people washed their bedding and one of the first posters came on to smugly say she did hers every few days on a boil wash, cue dozens of people coming on to ask her what she was doing to her sheets that she needed to regularly boil them.

[Kismett]

I do tend to strip off outdoor clothes and wipe down hair and arms and such. But that’s for allergens, not some vague fear of the outside. Doing a very hot wash for bedding has made a world of difference for me.

[SoyDora]

*1. Tea towels kitchen towels, oven gloves 60.

1. Red wash at 40
   
2. Dark wash 40 - sometimes separated into undies and shirts if enough for 2 washes.
   
3. Baby wash 40
   
4. White clothes 60
   
5. Bed linen 60 (this alone is a full drum)
   
6. Towels at 60 or 90 (90 always if DH's cheesey towel)
   
7. Sports wear and bras low spin 4o
   
8. Wool - wool wash 30
   

10. Cleaning clothes quick cycle*

I couldn’t even be bothered to read this, let alone do it .

Had a housemate who would wash the tea towels with the bath mat, pedestal mat and the toilet mat together. Always off-putting when you find pubes on your tea towel

How were they getting pubes on the bath mat/toilet mat?! I don’t think either DH or I have ever randomly shed pubes on to our mats.

[TheCraicDealer]

I do towels separately because I can never tell what's been used and what hasn't so I just do all of them at the same time- I'm sure some would be horrified to hear we use towels more than once before they go in the wash I also don't use fabric softener on towels so easier to do a separate wash.

Knickers go in with anything of a similar colour. I usually sling tea towels and kitchen cloths in with the towels or DH's sports stuff at 40, again because I don't use fabric softener with those-apparently it makes sweat cling to the fabric on sportswear. If anything is heavily stained or soiled I use some Napisan.

Can't get my head round worrying about germs on clean, dry fabric- same with people splashing bleach about like it's about to go out of fashion. I wouldn't want a sterile home, it can't be good for you.

[DeadBod]

Has anyone asked this question on the ama thread where the poster developed laundry detergents? She would surely have the definitive answer.
(Sorry if it's been done, I've only skimmed through the thread).

[AnnieAnoniMoose]

Tea towels and nappies together 🤮

Tea towels & dishcloths (both single use only) have their own wash.

Bathmats have their own wash, but, ours are used to dry down the closed toilet lid as it’s a wet room.

Pants go in with other clothes, all washed at 40. Colour sorted.

Towels have their own wash.

To me, mixing pants and tea towels is grim. Something that has been on your bum shouldn’t be washed with something that will polish a glass someone else will drink from. It’s just not right.

[SoyDora]

I don’t dry dishes with tea towels. It all dries in the dishwasher then goes away.

[SoyDora]

Something that has been on your bum shouldn’t be washed with something that will polish a glass someone else will drink from. It’s just not right

But the whole point is that the dirt from the towel is washed away when you wash it. Otherwise what’s the point in washing anything?!
After you’ve washed towels (with that mysterious bum juice on) do you clean out and sterilise your washing machine before washing your tea towels?