Why Adding a Weekly Laundry Day to Your Routine Makes Your Days Easier
Inside: How to add a designated laundry day to your housekeeping routine to help you tackle one of the homemaker’s most dreaded chores. Yes, this strategy helps even if you do laundry every day
It’s not the washing and drying you hate. It’s not even the folding. It’s the putting away, the sorting, missing socks, the weird things that have no home. And most of all, it’s the never-endingness of it all. I know. I know.
But here’s a solution: one day a week, wash your linens, towels, and any special items needed for events coming up. Do mending and ironing, check your supplies, and tidy up your laundry space.
But! (This is important!) You should still do a load per day to keep up (or if your family is smaller, a load whenever you have a full basket). This is the bare minimum to keep things from descending into chaos. Your daily load maintains, your laundry day helps you get ahead
Getting Started
Pick a Day. Monday is the classic laundry day for many people. Ma Ingalls washed her clothes on Monday, and if you can’t pick a day, Monday is a great choice.
Why? Well, Monday feels like a fresh start and a fresh start calls for clean clothes and clean sheets. Families also tend to be home a lot on Monday’s after busy weekends, which makes a home-based chore like laundry a great choice.
Adding a laundry day to your routine is easy. Pick a day and start washing stuff. Start with the sheets and towels, then move on to any lingering clothes if there’s time.
If you pick a day and it’s not working, change it! Routines exist to help you, not trap you.
Decide on Your Tasks. There are plenty of laundry tasks in the world, but they don’t have to all be done in one day. Here are some ideas, but you probably can’t do them all!
- Wash the bedding and towels
- Wash clothes
- Wash kitchen towels and dish rags
- Wash bathmats
- Wipe down the washer and dryer
- Soak stained clothing
- Organize the laundry room shelving
- Iron
How to Make This Easier
Sometimes having a themed housekeeping day makes things feel like more work, and that is not what we’re going for! We’re trying to make the whole routine of laundry easier.
- Stop washing clean clothes! Hang up church clothes to be worn again. Kids clothes can be worn a few times unless they are actually dirty.
- Eliminate extra bedding. Ditch the extra “stuff” that has to be folded and stored. You only really need ONE set of sheets per bed. Wash them and put them right back on.
- Less clothing = less to wash. Children especially will do fine with a minimal wardrobe (and so will you!)
- Declutter laundry supplies. You only need a detergent, stain remover, and dryer sheets. That’s it! Even babies clothing will usually be fine with regular detergent and an extra rinse.
- Wash clothes by person, not by color. Of course grandma would be shocked by this, but with a few exceptions, it’s not really necessary to sort clothes by color. And the simplest way to sort clothes is by person.
- Delegate. Some great tasks for even the smallest helpers include checking pockets, moving clothes to the dryer, wiping down the machines with a damp cloth, and cleaning out the lint trap.
No one loves doing laundry—well, probably someone does—but you can make it as enjoyable as possible.
How to Enjoy Doing Laundry (Sort Of.)
Keep your space neat. Before you get started, and as you work, tidy up the space you are in. If your washer and dryer are in your mudroom, tidy up the shoes and coats before you begin. It makes an amazing difference in your attitude when you are in a messy room vs. a neat one.
Make it pretty. If you can invest in some pretty containers for your supplies, do it! Powdered detergent and laundry pods look nicer in glass jars. Dryer sheets can lay flat in a small tray or basket.
If you make your own stain removal soap, you’ll have pretty bars you can put on the shelf. When the everyday things of life are beautiful, you don’t need any more decorations.
Have a good attitude
Perfection is not the goal. Laundry is a never-ending task. Done is better than perfect, but laundry will never be done (or perfect). We’re just trying to keep our routines moving and get ahead when we can.
At the risk of sounding preachy, keep this in mind: doing laundry is an act of service to people you love. Not everyone in the world has a family, or a working washing machine, or lots of clothes to wear. Make the best of it and count your blessings. And don’t forget a job well done is its own reward.
By Katie Shaw
Katie shares simple, reliable recipes from her home in Virginia, where she lives with her husband, three daughters, a chocolate lab, and over thirty chickens.
I love all these recommendations. Thanks to Katie, before I start a load of laundry I first think “will I have time to not only wash this load but also dry, fold/hang, or put away TODAY?” If not, I wait until tomorrow so I don’t have stacks of unfinished laundry in my laundry room. I also liberally use my delay feature on the washer. I put in a load to wash at night and time it so the load finishes when I’ll be ready to put it in the dryer in the morning. That really expedites completing a load a day. Lastly, I have two collapsible rods hanging in the laundry room with a few clothes hangers on the ready. This allows me to immediately remove clothes from the dryer and hang them up, if needed.
I do my laundry on Saturday. it’s just my husband and I, so one day takes care of everything – clothing, linens, cleaning cloths. I normally have four loads and that’s it! I also hang everything outside when the weather cooperates. I understand the concept of daily laundry for a large family, but for us it would be wasteful. I am going back to my grandmother’s schedule when I retire in the fall. wash on Monday, iron on Tuesday…
Thank you for your great posts. They’re helping me get back to a slower pace of life.
I actually like doing laundry. Since it’s just my husband and me I wash every Saturday. Four loads a week – light colors, dark colors, linens (sheets, towels, napkins and kitchen towels and cloths), cleaning rags. Once a month or as needed I wash throw rugs. In good weather everything hangs outside. I love folding and ironing. For my little family, this works best.
Sorry, but you do not need only one set of sheets per bed. The best idea is to have three: one for the bed, one for the wash, and one for spare. This is in case of illness or accidents and the linen needing to be changed in a hurry. It happens. At the very least, two will suffice.
Dryer sheets are not necessary. Vinegar will help to soften and get rid of static. A good cool rinse helps too afterward. Dryer sheets are nothing but plastic coating, and in time wear on the towels ability to absorb. Not good for the environment either. It is important in my opinion to care of our world. It is where we, and other creatures, live.
Hi Kate, I guess I’m in the minority, I love doing laundry. It’s a great chance to do something for my family. Every time they put on a clean shirt, with no stains, they are happy. And that makes me happy. It’s also peaceful. My daughter sorts her laundry for me and what a chance to talk with her, one on one!! We might start talking about a stain, but then we talk about how it got there, ( that joke at lunch that had everyone laughing so hard she dropped her sandwich) and end up with a moment. There is something very satisfying taking a pile of dirty smelly clothes and turning it into a fresh clean neatly folded pile. My laundry area does have a nice rug, good paint and is very functional and pretty.
Hi Katie, I’m loving your site and all your inspiring articles. I never thought to wash clothes by person. That’s a great idea! I’d like to encourage you, though, to stop using dryer sheets. After reading this article I don’t think you’ll need to be convinced: https://www.today.com/shop/why-you-shouldnt-use-dryer-sheets-t283180