Help! Please tell me your laundry routines!

[AddictedToCrisps]

I seem to constantly have overflowing laundry baskets even though I’ve got airers up most days. I’m sure I need a better routine. What do you all do? Should I have certain days for certain things eg towels, uniform. We are a family of 4. I try to use my tumble dryer sparingly and find lots of our clothes are not tumble dryer friendly. I hate having airers up in the dining room but I’ve got nowhere else to put them. I bought a stand up heated airer but it’s not that cost effective eg 1 hour to dry 6 t-shirts on hangers. I feel like everyone else manages to keep on top of things but I don’t.

Thanks!

4 in this house. Dark wash or a light wash as soon as theres enough to fill machine. Everything into tumble tryer, air dry nothing. 1 hour does the wash, 1 hour dry. Put away out of sight within 2 hours start to finish.

This is my clothes airer, I'm so happy with it.

www.castinstyle.co.uk/product.php/1330/stacker-gismo-kitchen-maid-reg-pulley-clothes-dryer

Wash clothes when required, towels, bath mats and bedding washed weekly. I’ve spilt mine and OH’s socks and underwear, we both have about 10 days worth and I keep
mine in a laundry bag, inside the washing basket and wash it separately. It saves me deciding which black sock belongs to whom and I deposit his clean stuff on his side of the bed for sorting
Most adult clothes get shaken and hung up on wooden hangers to dry, we both hate ironing. Most things requiring ironing (not many) subsequently get shoved in the tumble drier, removed as soon as they are aired and hung up
DD’s uniform and most of her clothes go on a clippy multi hanger thing in the utility room, then into the tumble drier for a few min to get rid of creases, before being hung up, or rolled (Kondo style)
We have a heated airer from Lakeland for adult PJs, leggings, towels, bedding, etc

Reading that, it looks like a right faff, but I’m sooo lazy when it comes to flipping laundry and this is a doddle!

I don't have a routine but I have 3 laundry baskets in my room for darks, whites and lights. Everyone puts their clothes in at the end of the day. When one is full I load up the washer at night on an eco wash to finish in the morning, put it in the dryer when I wake up.
Fairly straightforward and I do about 4/5 loads a week. I have a 10kg washer and large dryer.

5 of us here. I also do 1 or 2 loads a day. It's just never ending. I hated having clothes all over radiators but now I have invested in an air dryer. It's changed my life. Washing is so much quicker. I use my dryer for towels and bedding still.

Two adults, one child. Two or three loads on Monday and Tuesday, hung out, dried and put away by Wednesday. One small wash uniform wash on Friday. We wear things more than once. I send anything extra out for a service wash. That gives me Thursday - Sunday relatively laundry free. We're in a small flat without a tumble drier so it makes a difference

1 adult 1 toddler.
I train most days and toddler has wet pjs or bedding.
At least 1 load a day which is easy to keep on top of
Monday - Friday I have the Airer up but keen to try something different and can't wait for line in the harden

This time of year I put everything in the tumble dryer, other than leggings and non-vpl pants.
Even things that say ‘no tumble’ are ok on a cool cycle. Otherwise you just have wet washing everywhere!

Simple routine here: all dirty clothes go straight in the washing machine, which goes on as soon as the rotary airer in the living room is clear. All done in no time at this time of year.

The system used to get backed up pretty frequently until I kicked DD's dad out. Possibly a rather drastic solution but worth bearing in mind if all else fails?

5 of us
Each of us has their own laundry basket under the bed.
Each has responsibility for washing, drying and putting away their own clothes. (If they can work a flight simulator on the Xbox, they can navigate a washing machine and tumble drier)
Except the 6 year old who is a shirker

The main saboteur to the system is DH who leaves clothes all over the house, loses his basket, winds up wearing his swimming trunks etc but none of that is my problem.

I am very smug about it all as it took me 15 years to perfect the system.

The system used to get backed up pretty frequently until I kicked DD's dad out. Possibly a rather drastic solution but worth bearing in mind if all else fails?

Towels twice a week, darks once a week, lights or whites once a week, sheets once a week, delicates once a week. Cleaning cloths when we’ve amassed a load. We have a lot of cleaning cloths.

Six of us here, too, and I’m absolutely drowning in laundry so reading with interest.

@Spanielmadness Is that right that even ‘no tumble dry’ can be dried on a low setting?? This may be a game changer.... I’m finding almost everything we have for dc from Primark has the cross through the dryer symbol. My dryer is a cheap one which is vented and only has low/high option. Would the low setting be ok for virtually everything then??

4 people, one basket. I only do any separating during term time so I have enough pale bits to do DS's school tops in. Otherwise a load about every 2 days, all chucked in together.

We got a tumble dryer this year and I use it for 90% of things. Iron in front of the tv twice a week.

Basket is never overflowing and is emptied every other day because I just chuck all of it in one load.

I think my problem is that when I get through a massive amount of washing, I’m so happy that I reward myself with days off then it piles up again

AddictedToCrisps we had a tumble dryer years ago and I chucked absolutely everything in there. Never even looked at the labels first. Was fine, except for underwired bras.

Really impractical tip because it's now far too late: try to get the kids into a school that doesn't have white in the uniform. DD's polo shirts are all red, meaning I haven't had to do a white wash since she was a baby. That was honestly the thing I was happiest about when we found out what school she'd got into!

3 of us with DD in cloth nappies and I have riding clothes that get filthy.
We do a minimum of 2 washes a day, sometimes 3-4. One wash goes in before bed on a timer for 6am. Second load goes in straight after that finishes.
Towels I do every Friday, bed linen on weekends so I can hang it out if weather ok (we have 2 superking beds).
We don’t tumble everything - towels, bed linen, a few clothes.
We have heated floors and find an airer over the heated floor dries quickly.

We always have something ready to wash but it never runs away with us.

How very complicated!

There are 4 of us, 2 adults and a 11 yo and 15 yo.

I wash on a Saturday and Sunday. Usually 4 washes on a Saturday does all our clothes, and 2 washes on a Sunday does bedding and towels.

Only use the tumble dryer and don't wash at all other than the weekend.

I tend to wash whenever the basket is full which is every other day. Underwear, bedding and towels are always tumble dried. Nice clothes are put on hangers to dry. In the winter everything else goes on a drier over the bath but I have to turn things regularly to get them dry.

I don’t iron anything which is time saving

5 of us here. I wash every day, even if there isn’t a full load. As soon as everyone is showered in the evening, the wash goes on and once it’s finished, it’s emptied, either in to the tumble dryer or put on the radiator/clothes dryer. Once it’s dry, I tend to fold it and leave it in baskets on the dining room table until my day off when I don’t it all and take it to the correct room.

I wash towels once a week and bedding every other week (alternating between ours one week and the dc the week after). I used to stress and wash beds each week, but I realised that no one actually cared and it is better for the household for me to have a bit of time to myself on my day off to relax a bit.
But my best tip, is to keep on top of it and put a load on every day and use the tumble dryer to get it Dried and out of the way quicker.

Thanks for the tip about the dehumidifier.

I've just moved the rotary airer to DS's room as sick of it dominating the living room.

I've been airing his bedroom every day as I noticed a huge build up of condensation since moving the washing up there.

5 of us here, 3 messy kids, 2 adults. I aim to do 1 load a day, which goes straight into the dryer when done, aside from the handful of non-tumble clothes which get hung out on radiators (maybe 3 t shirts or dresses per wash). I do one delicates load a week which goes on radiators with the dehumidifier on. And once it's all clean and dry it goes into a wash basket till it gets worn... I need to work on actually putting the clean clothes away!

@Mrsdoubtfireswig

One adult one child here and I do a load every day without fail otherwise it becomes a big pile and have one maiden up constantly too. I separate darks and lights but that’s it, everything goes in together apart from any bed changes from leaked nappy which go in with detail and dog beds (only washed every couple of months). Bedding, towels and some pjs go in the drier but most clothes don’t as they shrink

What the fuck do you wear to need a load every single day for two people?

There's 3 of us here and I do two loads a week!

Someone mentioned hanging from doorframes, which I used to do. However now I hang all tops and hoodies on hangers on the curtain poles in the back bedrooms (so it doesn't look like a laundrette from the road at the front 😂)

They're above the radiator and have plenty of space between so they dry so quickly!