Laundry Organizing

Laundry is one of life's never ending battles. It multiplies when you are not looking! It creeps up on you and you are left with a mountain of laundry! Unless you want to send everything out to the dry cleaner, you need to have a system in place to keep it all under control.

First things first, you need to clean out your laundry room. Whether its a finished space or in an unfinished basement, it still needs to be cleaned out. Wipe everything down, sweep, remove cobwebs, clean out your lint filter, etc. Anything that doesn't belong in there, should be re located to it's proper spot.

Have a laundry sorting area. I have large storage bins with the lids removed for my laundry. One for darks, one for lights, and one for my husbands work clothes. Make categories that would suit your needs ie: baby clothes, delicates, towels etc. Label them, and make sure everyone in the family understands what goes into each bin. Enlist the help of everyone in the household, you aren't the only one wearing clothes! Young children can sort by colours, and as they get older they can be responsible to carry their dirty laundry to the laundry room themselves. Teens can be responsibility for doing their own laundry or at least assisting you. Having them help from an early age will make things easier on you, and teach them responsibility.

Try and get into the routine of throwing in a load or two each day. Have a chair in front of your dryer to sit on for folding. When the dryer is still warm, take out each item, fold it, and put it in the clean laundry basket. Don't dump them all into the basket to fold later, because often later doesn't come. Take those few minutes then, and you'll have less wrinkles and less work later. If you dryer has cooled down, just run it for a minute to fluff everything up. While you're waiting for it to warm up, throw another load in the washer.

When you take the laundry basket to be put away, empty it out right away. Then refill your empty basket with any dirty laundry to be washed. If you have too many baskets, you'll find you will have too many piles of laundry to put away. If they are in more manageable piles, it will be easier to handle. Try and limit your baskets to 2 or 3. Each family member can put away their own clothing, young children will need some help. It took me a while (being a neat freak) to let my girls who are now 7 and 9 to do it, as they didn't put clothes away neatly all the time, but I've learned to let it go. They'll never learn how to do it unless they are given the opportunity, and it lessens your work load.

Staying on top of your laundry is easier than you think, and you'll be amazed at how much easier it is once you have a system in place.

Happy Washing!