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Housekeeping

Find cleaning advice from other Mumsnetters on our Housekeeping forum.

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Original poster

Where do you keep clothes you have worn but don't yet need washing?

51 replies

CinnamonStar · 04/12/2011 12:16

We have a big armchair in our bedroom. I have decided I am fed up with it being an expensive clothes horse for clothes that have been worn once but aren't ready for the washing basket yet. So I have moved it into the living room, to be used for its intended purpose.

Now there is nowhere to put clothes in the bedroom except on the floor. What does everyone else do? I am unwilling to move another chair in there, surely there is something better. I don't like putting worn clothes back in the cupboard, but maybe I should do that...

OP posts:

crystalglasses · 04/12/2011 23:19

Back in the cupboard or drawer. I dind't even know this was an issue!

Methe · 04/12/2011 23:23

On a chair. That's what bedroom chairs are for isn't it?

MrsJangleBalls · 04/12/2011 23:43

Yup, bedroom chair. That is exactly what they're for. I've never sat in mine yet.

CointreauVersial · 04/12/2011 23:49

My stuff loiters on my chair for a while until the pile gets too big and I can't sit at my dressing table, then I put it all back in the wardrobe.

I don't get the logic "how do you keep track of whether it needs a wash or not?" If it isn't grubby, and doesn't smell stale, it can be worn again, otherwise it goes in the wash. It's unimportant how many times I've actually worn something, it's either clean or it's not.

FFSEnid · 04/12/2011 23:54

On a chair. I couldn't rehang, I have no sense of smell and I would lose friends.

neolara · 05/12/2011 00:02

On the floor.

BertieBotts · 05/12/2011 00:07

Huge pile on the floor ATM.

I think my problem is I'm indecisive! I tend to wear stuff a few times/until it's grubby/smelly/whatever but the pile of half-clean stuff gets too big. I could put them back in the drawers, I suppose... although most clothing never gets there as I end up wearing it straight from the washing basket.

Tigerbomb · 05/12/2011 00:33

If it has been worn once, then it is straight in the washing basket. Same as the towels.

Tw1nkle · 05/12/2011 08:21

I'm so glad we're not the only ones who struggle with this!!!!

We pretty much drape them over a chair until we wear them again - then when chair is full, it all goes in the wash!!!

I like the hanger on the back of the door suggestion though too......

Original poster

CinnamonStar · 05/12/2011 09:10

Funny how many people have the same problem!

The hanger on the back of the door seems like an elegant solution - but unfortunately we already hang our dressing gowns there, so no more room.

I am on the verge of caving in and taking one of the kitchen chairs in there

OP posts:

winterfox · 05/12/2011 09:17

back in the wardrobe - i don't think i've ever seen any clothes attacked by moths!!

i don't get the problem of putting them back in the wardrobe i guess unless you stink a bit

Bramshott · 05/12/2011 09:18

You need a bedroom chair - something elegant like this . . . In my dreams that is, in reality we have an old wicker sofa across the end of the bed and I chuck my half-worn stuff over one arm and DH chucks his over the other.

LadyMontdore · 05/12/2011 09:18

Bedroom chair, that's what they are for! And dcs' on bathroom chair. DH seems to have a different system to me though, but involving the same chair so it can get a bit confusing.

Goldberry · 05/12/2011 09:21

Hang on - is it just me, or does this not make sense? What is the point of putting all these clothes on your chair if they are just going to pile up and then get either put back in the cupboard or washed anyway? Why not just put them in the wash straight away, or put them back in the cupboard straight away?
Anyway, if they are clean enough to be worn again, then why wouldn't they be clean enough to put back in the cupboard?

Bramshott · 05/12/2011 10:35

I tend to wear things for 2 days unless they're actively dirty, but if I put them back in the wardrobe I would forget which things were 100% clean, and which had been worn for 1 day already.

CointreauVersial · 05/12/2011 13:02

Goldberry - because as I stumble into the bedroom at stupid o'clock, trying not to wake a snoring DH, the last thing I am going to do is clatter about hanging up clothes. I know they should go straight into the wardrobe, but the chair is so much easier!

mazzi2fly · 05/12/2011 15:37

We have a set of hooks 4 for me and 4 for DH. I hang my jeans and cardis there. DH hangs up so much on the hooks that it eventually falls off - into the washing basket below!

JayneyMack · 07/12/2011 21:26

If I'm rehanging in the wardrobe after one wear, I turn it inside out before rehanging. Then when I take it out of the wardrobe for the second wear I know it needs to go in the wash when I take it off.

It would probably be clean enough to wear again but I love the smell of freshly washed clothes. Also in my job I can get in very close proximity to people and would feel less confident if I was worried my clothes didn't smell clean.

RainboweBrite · 10/12/2011 16:28

Bedroom chair or I. sometimes hang up cardigans, shirt s and dresses on hooks on the back of the door. I always get at least 2 wears out of all my clothes, apart from socks and underwear, which I change daily. I have a pair of tights I wore once 2 weeks ago on the chair, waiting for another wear.

EttiKetti · 10/12/2011 16:31

If it needs washing, it gets washed, otherwise put away. I'm not quite getting why you wouldn't do this? If its not clean enough to put away, wash it.

TeaOneSugarPlumFairy · 10/12/2011 19:39

If I'm going to wear it again, I hang it up, if it needs washing it goes in the wash.

I've never understood the half way house approach - doesn't everything get really creased if you pile it onto chairs?

dreamingofawhitexmasteamgirl · 12/12/2011 23:20

I cleared half a shelf in my beautiful built in wardrobes for once worns

It was one the very first things I did when I was getting my home back from the revolting mess I lived in and it worked wonders

LauraIngallsWilder · 12/12/2011 23:32

I have a magazine storage type thing at the end of my bed which does the job perfectly. Purchased from Ikea smaller and wider than this.
Mine looks more like a plain cream knitting bag (y'know the type that folds up as in my ikea link)

All clothes I will wear again get dumped inside or on top.
Every day or so I have a sort through to chuck stuff in the washing.

I have used it as it is (also hides lonely socks) for the last five years :)

FringeEvent · 12/12/2011 23:44

In our house it's known as the floordrobe

zumm · 13/12/2011 14:11

This is a good question! It's jumpers that I wear and re-wear (t-shirt/top under so not smelly). Surely no-one washes a jumper after one wear? (unless worn against skin)? Or do they?

Anyhow, I chuck drape jumpers on a chair. Messy cow emoticon.

Maybe I'll adopt the half a shelf in my built in wardrobe for this purpose from now on.... good idea dreaming.

My other failure (cough) is actually keeping wardrobe neat. My idea was to have piles of beautifully ordered stuff (like a 1980s Benneton shop). (Or maybe the sort of wardrobe that Trinny from What Not to Wear would have.) Instead I have scruff balls of unironed crap. Oh god.

So crap in and out of wardrobe. Double win.

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