There is nothing too terribly exciting about doing laundry, but I
actually enjoy doing it. My goal is
always to do it as simply, efficiently and inexpensively as possible. I even tried making my own laundry detergent
at one time but found our clothing wasn't getting as clean as I liked and they
had begun to develop an odor. Not cool.
A few years ago when our mismatched washer and dryer gave up the
ghost I splurged and purchased a front loading high efficiency matched set from
Home Depot. I had saved up for them in
anticipation of ours getting older but when I was offered 12 months no interest
I went that route and just incorporated the payments into our monthly budget
and kept our savings intact.
I find with these units I am able to get our laundry done much
easier and faster. We use less water
doing our laundry and the dryer works faster as well because the washer does a
fabulous job extracting water in the final spin cycle. I also use less laundry soap which has made
continuing to purchase our detergent more affordable.
As a family of three we can usually get by quite well washing two
loads on Sunday and a midweek load on Wednesday evening. The washer holds a lot of clothes and the
dryer as well. The girls help with the
folding and I am quick to get the clothes out of the dryer right away to avoid
wrinkles. I hate to iron.
I've lately been toying with the idea of tinkering with my
homemade laundry detergent recipe to see if I can make it better. I've also thought about using both homemade
and store bought and alternating them to see if I have better results. Lately, with sales prices and coupons, I've
managed to buy detergent so inexpensively that I don't know if it would be cost
effective or not and therefore worth the effort.
I currently use liquid detergent, liquid fabric softener as well
as dryer sheets, occasionally bleach and Spray & Wash when needed. I always buy my supplies on sale and with
coupons whenever I can. I buy the dryer
sheets at the dollar store. When the
weather is nice we like to hang our things outside as often as possible so I
use the liquid fabric softener the most.
I also reuse my dryer sheets and find I can get two to three loads dry
per sheet which is great because in the winter I use both liquid fabric
softener and the dryer sheets to control static.
One huge thing that has helped us tremendously in simplifying our
laundry process is that we own so much less stuff that needs to be
laundered. Fewer clothes, less bedding, less
to wash. It really is that simple. Love it!
Laundry is one of those things that I dread doing, but then when I start doing it I find that it really is no big deal at all. I like to hang my clothes to dry outside when I can- I love the crisp fresh air smell on them when they are done. I am currently using laundry detergent and dryer sheets from the dollar store. I used to use my favorite name brand and then I tried some homemade laundry detergent that a friend of mine made and let me try out. I wasn't crazy about the homemade, though it did get the job done. I also didn't want to go back to buying the name brand stuff so I decided to try some of the dollar store kinds and so far I've just stuck with those. I agree that simplifying our supplies and fewer things to wash really makes it easier. :)
ReplyDeleteYou can't beat line dried clothes for that fresh scent. Sheets and towels are my fave. I'm finding the less expensive brands of detergent seem to work as well as the name brand so I just save my pennies and buy the cheap stuff now.
DeleteI live in the south and we wear a lot of light (mainly white) cottons during the summer. I was not pleased at all with the homemade stuff on my whites and found the dollar tree variety tended to yellow them. Now I am back to brand name detergent, but I wait until my local grocery store has it bogo (every 6 weeks) I save all my coupons until then and stock up.
ReplyDeleteI wish we had fewer things to wash, but it is steaming hot here (except for today which is like fall) from May through late October and we change clothes at least twice a day, 3 times if we are going out at night.
Humidity wreaks havoc on a wardrobe, doesn't it? I noticed my whites were gray with the homemade stuff. Fortunately most of our stuff is dark. We really only get two months of super hot weather here and virtually no humidity.
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