Clothes washing question for you all

[saltire]

When you are doing washing, do you wait until you have a full load and then put the machine on, or do you wash things as they get taken off just to keep your laundry basket empty, even if it means washing only two or three small items?
I try and leave it till I have a full load, eg, DH's work shirts, and the DSs polo shirts all make up a full load, which i do at weekend, when i change the beds its a couple of full loads, but if i only need to change one sheet through the week i won't wash it until i have other things to go in with it, like towels. unless it's very wet and smelly
The reason I ask is beecause my mum is here, she has just came downstairs with a pair of socks, a t-shirt and a t-towel in her hand and said "These were in the laundry basket will I put them through a wash for you" I said no, there wans't enough to fill the machine, but her reply was "well you will have an empty basket then". She thinks i am strange because i wait until i have a full load. So I'm really interested to know if I am weird, or if she is!

saltire what is this 'ironing' of which you speak?

wandering I believe it's something people do to their clothes. DH does ours because, when we first got married I very cunningly made lots of lines in his RAF shirts! Not good, so he does most of it now!

What's a laundry basket for, if not to keep laundry in until you have a full load?

If you wash everything as soon as you've taken it off, a la saltire's mum, then you have no need of a laundry basket.

I wish I had that choice, sadly only an hour or 2 go by until I have a full load to do.

Sorry, wanderingtrolley, not ignoring your question, just couldn't answer it.

I have done nearly 4 loads today, and there are about another 8 waiting. I am with WanderingTrolley on this one. If there is not a full load available it is the work of but a few seconds to check the floor of the bathroom/bedrooms and hey, voila, another 10 loads are available.

WanderingTrolley - I have nominated your 15:10 post as quote of the week

Sorry i didn't get back to the thread, we were having a wee drink or 2 to celebrate Scotlands win at the footie.
Anyway, I showed mum the thread and told her that the whole of mumsnet now thinks she is really weird. She still says she can't understand why i don't just wash things as they get dirty, why i have to keep them till I have a load. I told her i was trying to do my bit to save the planet for my grandchildren

Ah now you've mentioned her ironing pile - does she perhaps cling to her perceived laundry 'efficiency' because she's rubbish at everything else? Because that's why I colourcode mine, it keeps me on top of the washing so that I know there's always clean clothes (I don't do ironing at all). All my other housekeeping is shit, laundry is the only thing I don't mind doing.

Would never dream of doing anything but a full load. Saying that my mum (in her 70's bless her) never has anything in her laundry basket, every morning all their smalls and light clothes are handwashed - the washing machine (they have a lovely one dying through lack of use) is only used for towels/sheets once/twice a week. I wonder whether older people (your mum is prob younger than mine) perhaps got into a routine of doing daily laundry??? I wish I could encourage my folks to use their machine just a tad more often as they are both finding things harder these days and it would save a lot of effort - have tried but the machine use is a weekly 'big event'!!!!!!!Oh well they score top marks for being green!!

i also only ever do a full load.... (probably too full actually; though not sure it can be too full, as one time i was clearing out airing cuobaord and washing everything at 60c, anyway i was weighing it in 7kg piles and i could not get 7kg of washing in our 7kg machine!)

which means i only do a white wash about once in 3 weeks!

My grandmother also has a lovely washing machine and wardrobe upon wardrobe of clothes yet does LOADS of hand washing as well i dont handwash ANYthing, not even hand wash only stuff cause it IS all fine in the machine anyway!

My mum would be 84 if she was still alive and her generation washed once a week, on a Monday, and it took all day (with or without a washing machine - when I was little ours was a single-tub thing with a mangle on the back , my nana had a copper in the corner of the kitchen and they washed in that and had a separate mangle)

Even with a twintub, washing was a major exercise. I think automatic washers have a lot to answer for!