To throw them out?

[beasmithwentworth]

The socks I mean. I have 2 teens and one lodger. I work all week then feel like I spend my weekends cleaning and hanging washing out as a lot of us do but the thing that fills me with rage is the odd socks. I’m at breaking point. So my plan is to throw all of the socks into the bin (I’ll allow a few sentimental pairs) and buy a job lot of black socks for all of us. Other exception will be DS 15 ‘needing’ his Nike socks. I’m understanding if nothing else. But apart from that. They are all going in the bin and being replaced with 5 thousand pairs of identical black socks so I will never have to worry about pairing again.

Unless there are some better ideas out there? I am so sick of putting the one sock from under the sofa in the washing machine anymore.

Friend with 3 sons and a husband bought different colours for each male. Black for one, grey for one etc. That worked till the boys decided they wanted different socks. So, white Nike socks for one, get DD to choose a type and so on. Might be a plan. At one point ExDp and DD wore very similar socks and there were accusations of sock stealing. I put little tags in the back of DDs socks. Probably a step too far but it worked.

I quite like pairing socks, but then I like jigsaw puzzles and spelling out rude words with Alphabetti Spagetti.

I also wash each of my children’s socks in a laundry bag. I have 3 girls so it took so long to sort them all out!
The laundry bags are a game changer. I put them in the dryer still in the bags after and just return to it’s owner and they have to pair and put away

This is how I solved this issue in my house.

1. ask everyone to go through their sock drawer and find all the waifs and strays that have separated in there. Put them through the wash
2. get a bag (we use a net bag) which is the odd sock bag. When pairing up the socks all odd ones go in the bag.
3. get a teenager to go through the bag once a month to pair them up. Any that can’t be paired get thrown away.

It has saved my sanity.

My mother safety pins socks together before they go in the machine. There is a little box of pins by the laundry basket

I did this. Game changer.

well to clarify I bought loads from the sock shop. They come in bright colours so easy to pair up. And me and the kids all share. It’s genius.

Sock shop bamboo ones are 4 for a tenner and extra win for autistic / sensory stuff as they are so comfy.

if you buy mens size ones you can wear them too unless your feet are tiny x

I stopped pairing socks, as it drove me insane trying to do so. I often found the 'missing' socks somewhere. Now I just grab all the socks that aren't mine, and tell DH and DS to sort them out.
It now seems they don't mind wearing odd ones.

I used to keep all the odd socks that I couldn't pair and put them in a tub, because as soon as I had thrown the 'odd' away, its pair would almost inevitably turn up.

Any socks that were left odd (and there were five kids and me so there were a LOT of random socks) I used to use to stuff cushions which we used as the dog bed.