Laundry Mondays

For a little more than two months now, Mondays have become Laundry Day.

I ventured onto this new scheduled task for one reason. Time. I was constantly interrupting my day to move the laundry forward. Usually I would remember that I was mid-way through a load of laundry at the most inopportune times: read aloud, making lunch, on the way out the door, bedtime or - the worst - when B was tromping through the house looking for clean jeans when he should have been on his way to work.

It seemed as though I was constantly doing laundry. Every day I would have to traipse down to the laundry area in the basement and get a load going. Then, I would have to remember that I was doing laundry. More times than not, I would get through 2ish loads a day. A day!! First, that's a lot of laundry. Second, that's a lot of forgotten laundry. Wrinkled laundry. Unfolded laundry. Laundry sitting in the dryer, or worse, the washer. All in all, I was doing 11 or 12 loads a week.

If that's not scary enough for you, this should do it: I haven't yet counted in the bed sheets and linens. Who feels like doing beds when the laundry rooms always backlogged?? It's pretty bad when the 9-year-old boy is seen bringing his sheets downstairs because they need a wash. This is the same 9-year-old who insists he only needs to shower every two weeks because the sweat he works up at hockey and soccer is enough of a wash for him.

12 to 15 loads per week depending on if the beds got done. That seems excessive when you add it all up.

So, Mondays are now laundry days. The laundry sits, sorted, in hampers in the laundry area until Monday morning. I wash, dry, sort and fold everyone's clothes. I've been managing it all in 4 loads: whites, colours, darks and denims. By the end of the day, the washer is empty, the dryer is empty, shirts are hung, socks are paired and everything is ready to be put away.

Savings? Less water, less hydro, less time. I'm doing 1/3 the laundry. I'm using the dryer less as I refuse to let the wet stuff pile up while I wait for the dryer to completely dry every load. Damp things can be hung. I know that if I can just get the laundry caught up on Mondays, I can forget about it for the rest of the week.

This means that bright and early on Tuesdays, I wake up to a row of empty hampers. Well, I would if I woke up in the basement. But I don't. I have to schlep my sleepy self down there to get to the clean clothes I washed, dried, sorted, folded and left there yesterday. What better time to change the sheets than when I have a totally available laundry area? So, Tuesdays have become Linen Day. I wash the sheets. And towels. And facecloths. And dish towels. And if I get ambitious, I'll do the dog's blanket. She sheds a lot.

In the space of two days, I do 6 - or 7 if a duvet or comforter needs it - loads of laundry. Fully half of what I was not really accomplishing very well before. Everyone has clothes that are clean, everyone has a bed that is fresh and the best part is the freeing feeling of not having to think about laundry until Monday rolls around again.