How do you deal with your washing?!

[mollysmum82]

I'm just curious what other people's laundry habits are. I never seem to see wet washing hanging at anyone else's house so I wondered what I was missing! Obviously when it's a glorious day you can hang it outside but if you don't have a utility room and its peeing it down what do you do? Do you tumble dry everything? (If I try this everything seems creased beyond repair) or do you just iron everything from wet? What other options are there? How often and when do you do your washing? I feel like such a novice at this house keeping malarkey! Thanks so much for any tips!

2 adults, 2 6 year olds. We average about one load per day and never get to the bottom of the laundry pile. Separate washer and dryer (I've had a washer/dryer in the past and they were rubbish).

We tumble pretty much everything but if you get it out and fold it when it's still hot you can get away without ironing stuff like tee shirts. Leave it in the dryer to get cold and it will look like a map of the alps.

We iron the minimum but that still means school dresses, shirts and smart skirts or trousers.

And going for a run, etc, is usually preceded by a foraging expedition in the laundry pile. Which live in three (white, dark, coloured) IKEA laundry bins (which were about £3 and are brilliant).

No tumble drier here. I line dry as much as possible, even in Winter it's worth "lightening" the towels and jeans outside. I hang stuff in a south facing room with the window open to air or an airer next to a radiator, again you have to air the room.

To avoid the need to iron:

empty washing machine as soon as it's finished,

shake out and smooth clothes really well,

line dry if possible,

don't buy linen or creasable cotton,

get shirt-wearers to iron their own.

And yes to getting a washing machine with a high spin speed. It will reduce drying so much.

Ooh, i'm so glad someone asked this! I was beginning to think i was being a bit wasteful as our washing pile seems to have suddenly increased by quite a bit!

We're 2 adults, 1 7yo, 1 4mo in cloth nappies. I do a wash per day on 40 of clothes, nappies and wipes. Then at the weekend i do an extra wash per day of towels and sheets and nappies and wipes on a hot wash. We only wash stuff if it's dirty (we're not one of those 'wear it once and wash it' kind of families) but somehow we all seem to get through at least 1 change of outfit a day! I don't separate whites and colours.

Dry on an airer in our attic room and on doors and chairs around the house if no one is coming over. We have a washer dryer but it's awful and eats through electricity!

I line-dry if possible. If not, I use an airer in a spare bedroom, with a dehumidifier running in there. Shirts etc go on hangers. The water tank on the dehumidifier fills up, the washing dries.

I do use the tumble drier for towels and underwear, if there's a bit of a backlog.

I hate washing, It is the bane of my life. I have always said that if i could outsource one thing it would be washing.

We need to do a load a day, but we don't always 2 adults 1 child 1 toddler.

I barely cope with the washing. There's always racks and racks of it hanging around win the house, mainly in our conservatory.

I have no idea how to generate less, the toddler gets filthy, he gets me filthy. DH has smart work clothes which he needs to be fresh everyday. DD spends as many days as possible in her uniform. We have a heated airer from lakeland but it still takes ages. It's takes at least twice as long to dry it as it does to wash it so I'm always behind.

I have room for a tumble and can afford to buy a tumble but I couldn't afford the electricity to run the damn thing.

If we get backed up with washing too much if theres a D&V in the house or something then I take the wet stuff to the laundrette to dry it.

After posting on this thread I actually went and brought the Lakeland Heated Airer - though I have been pondering it for a few years now.

It's a birthday present to myself. WOW!!! Happy 46th birthday Becool!

This is my system:-

1. Everything goes in together on a 40 quick wash first thing. Unfortunately my washing machine quick wash doesn't have a very fast spin so I give it a separate fast spin after it's done. Whole thing takes less than 45 mins.
2. Everything gets hung up on the dryer thing on the utility ceiling, unless there's loads in which case the smalls get done in the dryer. I never tumble any clothes which need ironing as they get too creased and shrink.
3. Yesterdays stuff which is now dry gets ironed and everything put away. All done by 9.30 in the morning, generally.
4. I do a couple of extra washes a week of towels and bedding.

3 loads a week.
Everything bunged in together at 40°c.
Hung outside everyda on clothes rack/clothes horse, if raining it goes in spare rom with window open
Don't iron (well, maybe 10 items of clothing a year). DH does his own. He works from home, so no smart clothes; my job requires nothing fancy, certainly not ironing 2yo's clothes!

My Mum hangs washing out all winter, as you do get those sharp sunny winter days. But she puts her pop-up gazebo over the line so they don't get hit by rain/snow showers.

In my old house where the dialogs were high enough, I had a Victorian dryer rack thing over the fridge which dried clothes in a day as the back of the fridge gives off heat. Probably a bit if a potential fire hazard though.

I'm jealous of everyone who manages to not iron my washing is always so creased. From this thread I'm going to try smaller loads and remove as soon as cycle finishes. But wanted to ask my washing 40 degree General cycle has a spin of 1400 automatically set. Should I reduce this? Or will this result in really wet clothes?

My Mum puts her pop-up garden gazebo over the washing line to keep rain/snow showers off the laundry in the colder months.

Upstairs landing is ideal for drying in winter, all that heat rising up the stairwell. If I was handy I'd fix a retractable drying line across the stairwell for the purpose. Or a Victorian airer on a pulley system.

This reminds me of living in Yorkshire,mwhere the back to back houses had no gardens so there were set days where everyone parked their cars up the end of the road and we all strung washing lines across the road. It was very homely and sociable having a chat on your neighbour's doorstep with all their frillies flapping about in your face, haha!

grew I wouldn't reduce the spin, but when you hang up the washing do it immediately, and straighten everything out by pulling and flattening with your hands as you hang it up. It really is like using an iron on a low heat when you do that!

Can high spin cause things to shrink?

I do few loads a week, dry out in the garden if weather is definitely dry, if not, a rack in our conservatory or inside the living room if radiator is on. Tumble dry if no more room to hang. I don't iron :)

I live alone. I still do about 4 loads of washing a week but this is because I am obsessive particular about separating whites from other stuff and do sheets towels and knickers at 60 deg but everything else at 40 deg (unless very delicate where it might be 30) I have a clever washer that on some settings works out how heavy the wash is and therefore how much water is needed. so it isn't so bad washing a small load.

I don't have a tumble dryer and I don't really want one. My rotary airer broke a week or so back ( fell over as it had rusted through at base just after I had put a load of white sheets and pillowcases on!) and I have a new one and new soil spike (wouldn't fit old one!) to put out now, thus guaranteeing it will rain constantly for the next 6 months!

I find this time of year and in the Spring hardest to get washing dry ( when it can be quite wet outside but I don't need to put heating on) but I hang stuff on an airer in my spare doom and I also have a dehumidifier in there that I use if there is a lot to dry at once!

When the heating is on, I will put very nearly dry washing on radiators for a final airing but try not to put wet washing on as it makes the heating very inefficient!

I don't have an airing cupboard, but would quite like one!

I don't understand why anyone needs to do a wash load every day (or more). Surely people have enough clothes for dirty washing to wait at least 2 or 3 days to build up to a load of the same colour? It must be so wasteful of water and electricity....Genuinely intrigued, as I seem to be in the minority reading this thread.

We are family of 4 and do 3-4 washes a week, including towels and bedding and yes we do wear clean clothes every day. I hang out where possible and only tumble dry when necessary in bad weather.

There are a couple of us, yickety, but indeed do seem in a minority. The only reason I do as much washing as I do (three or four loads a week) is to get DS's school uniform clean, as he only has three jumpers and spills his lunch down them pretty much every day. However, I'm just going to buy more jumpers!

I probably do 4 or 5 washes a week, plus towels and bedding.

DS is a teenager and plays rugby twice a week for school and twice a week for the town. Then there are school shirts/jumpers, pyjamas, clothes he wears (and gets sweaty in!) skateboarding after school, underwear, socks etc.
DH has a clean t-shirt, shirt and jumper for work every day. Wears jeans/trousers a couple of times.
I wear everything once and then wash it.

We have an old-fashioned drying rack on a pulley,and everything dries almost overnight on there if it too wet outside. Can't imagine life without it,but will have to as we're moving house!

Until recently there were three of us, me, DBH and 18 year old son now at uni. the washing has halved, I was doing 8 loads a week easily because of all their sports clothes. Son also did CCF so his uniform for that had to be spotless every week. Even though my husband does athletics twice a week or more, bevause his clothes are now so thin and light nowadays I am only doing three loads a week or occasionally four and that includes bedding and towels. It's really rather nice. In the meantime Son is finding uni washers extremely expensive at £5 a go for washing and drying so is having to make all his clothes last for two days and is hand-washing all his underwear! I'm stunned.

Until last year I didn't have a drier, but I found it impossible to cope when my daughter and her family come to stay. The whole house was draped in washing, every radiator and damp steamy windows. Not a good look at xmas. So the drier is in one of the greenhouses with a freezer and acts as an overwintering plants humidifier, with the freezer keeping the plants above freezing. It works very well.

Where it all goes wrong is 'washing after one wear'. Surely only pants, socks, smelly sports stuff and anything covered by a child in food/pooh/snot needs washing after one wear.

Clothes last longer too, if they aren't washed too often.

Yes herb, but with a toddler I'm doing well if any of my clothes aren't soaked in snot or splatter with soup or something by the end if the day.

Less of a problem in summer when I loved in lightweight cotton dresses, now I need to wash Jeans and jumpers.