10 No-Messin’ Rules for an Efficient Laundry Day

The Mama of All Bung-It-In-Bags

You think I'm kidding don't you?  I'm so NOT kidding.  I've only gone and written a perrrrrroper, nice and domesticated blog post!  This will knock your socks off. Just make sure you pick 'em up and clean 'em after.

My Hardcore, No-Messin’ 10 Rules for an Efficient Laundry Day

Our new Piece & Jam Collection takes iconic shapes and phrases and turns them into mini-artworks on every day stuff. Sound a bit arty farty? It's not really - this approach to our products comes from trying to make the paraphernalia of housewifery fun, not just functional.

I am not known for my enjoyment of washing chores (I'm a very shoddy Domestic Operating Officer), but that’s exactly why I need it to be an efficient and time-saving operation.  I would rather be sewing, you see?!  So here it is:

1)   Count your pegs. Have I gone mad? Seriously – count your pegs, and check out how much hanging space you’ve got. We’ll come back to the pegs and line in a minute...

2)   Sort your laundry bins. Don’t have huge ones. But do have a few, because you’re going to sort clothes the moment you get naked, my friends. Establish the following laundry baskets:

a.   one for white undergarments

b.   one for dark undergarments

c.   one for workshirts

d.   one for dark clothes

e.   one for light clothes

f.   I tend to shove all the kids’ clothes in one or two bins divided into lights/brights

g.  I have one for woollens and silks etc (which, ahem, never really get washed.) Anyway – you get the drift, yes?

Try to plan your Laundry Baskets so they relate to where you put things away – so if you have all the kids' tops and t-shirts in one chest of drawers, have a laundry basket for that category.  All the husbands’ pants and socks in one chest of drawers?  A laundry basket for that category. 
Pyjama drawer? Pyjama laundry basket.

3)   DON’T move your laundry baskets from their allotted positions, on pain of death! They live there to catch yer smelly smalls – let your Laundry Bags do the moving jobs.

Disobey the Receptacle Rule at Your Peril

4)   Start thinking in ‘loads’ and ‘receptacles’. Have SMALL receptacles such as laundry bags to take your stuff from laundry basket to washing machine. We designed our Laundry Bags in two sizes – half and full load!  Don’t overload!  Too much and you’ll end up with ditched knickers on the floor. Moreover you’ll have too many clothes to hang on the line and not enough pegs to hang them with!  Ah, do you see? Told you it would make sense.

5)   Obey the Receptacle Rule: Always have Only One Load Per Receptacle, and Always One Receptacle Per Load! The laundry bag is like a faithful bodyguard – it stays with its load at all times.  Leave the bag by the machine (a line of rustic hooks on the wall by the machine is perfect for hanging bags on), and there it is – ready to decant your shiny smalls into when done.  

6)   The Load fits the Line! Now your perfectly size-defined load of washing will magically fit the number of pegs in your lovely Peg Bag, and the amount of space on your line.

Peg Bags like art. Bring it, they say.

7)   When dry – fold as you take down. And this is where that tip about matching your laundry baskets to where things live helps – on a good day, I fold all the items from the line onto a chair, then carry up and put them all away in just ONE place, not 18! No stray teatowels, no odd socks, no belligerent towels creeping in. And the trusty Laundry Bag gets put back upstairs, ready for its next lovely filthy occupants.

8)   One in the Machine, One on the Line, One to Put Away. Have a Maximum of 3 rule! A cheeky queue of Laundry Bags next to the washing machine isn’t so bad, if you have a utility room that can accommodate such guests, but get upstairs and put the clean and dry ones away first, you slattern you.

9)   Have a Washing Calendar.  If you’re really efficient, you can even do a calendar, for all your categories, including towels and sheets (for which bulky monsters our beefy Bung-It-In Bag is designed). Not forgetting of course, Sunday Evening at 9.30pm – School Uniforms.  Ahem...

10) Be green in your washing choices - if you prefer a stiffer alternative to Laundry Bags, you could try sourcing a fairtrade jute basket, or look for a recycled plastic basket like the ones in Folksy store Merja’s Crochet Recycle.  For other washday products, try Nigel’s Eco Store; for some cool British-made and green pegs, you could give these recycled clothes pegs from GreenTree a try and if you really want to have some fun – make your own cleaning products – that’s what I do.  For all the ingredients to make them, try Summer Naturals, and give this smashing little book a try – Natural Stain Removers, by Angela Martin.

Ooh, you'll be mean, green cleaning machines in no time!

Waffling On

I think it's high time I subjected you all to some of my recipes, in celebration of my latest craft effort.

A waffleknit knitted dishcloth. I can hear my good neighbour groaning and raising her eyes to heaven but it was her who started it. We were sitting outside two summers ago (it can't have been last summer because I distinctly remember it was hot and there was some of that yellow stuff in the garden, what's it called, um, oh yes - sunshine), drinking tea no doubt, and probably considering stopping one of three small children throwing or smearing sand at or on one of the other of the three small children, or in the case of Hetty, stopping her from eating it. Somehow we got onto the subject of cleaning (how? Of all things, why on earth were we talking about cleaning? It's bad enough having to do it) and Her Next Door said, have you got that vinegar book? And there's a bicarbonate of soda one too. Ooh I thought, and before you know it I had bought them. But even better I came across this book, Natural Stain Removers, which is like a recipe book for cleaning products. It has everything you could possibly need.

Now then, I've just sat here and done some maths which is terribly unlike me - adding up how much I've spent on my cauldron of natural goodies since June 2008, and then some very exciting research on the Tesco website to see how much conventional cleaning products are. I took as my example a fairly lax and shoddy type of cleaning person (me) and worked out what products they would use in a month, and in what quantities. I'm not being unfair here - I've gone for own brand all the way, (which are usually substantially cheaper than brand named products) and worked out how many uses I'd get from the products - so for example, with the best will in the world, it's going to take me 3 months to get through some pine floor cleaner because at best I only manage to clean the floors once a week no matter how filth ridden they are. My list is very basic - washing tablets, fabric conditioner, stain remover for collars and cuffs and paint and bolognese and mud and glue; washing up liquid, kitchen cleaner, bathroom cleaner, toilet cleaner, furniture polish, window/mirror cleaner, floor cleaner. Fairly basic kit of stuff, no? Probably even forgotten something obvious. At a conservative estimate, I'd say you're paying £15 per month for all those. Which is £180 a year.

I buy my goodies at Summer Naturals, and spent initially £60 on bulk quantities of things which are going to last me, frankly, until doomsday. I mean 8 months, a year, more even....

The massive 5kg bag of bicarbonate of soda is hilarious - it's like a huge bag of coal. The whopping bottles of white vinegar take me months and months to get through, the glycerine will be years of use, and I have neat, dainty bottles and containers of soda crystals, borax, liquid soap, soap flakes, lemon juice and my lovely essential oils all stacked in nice baskets. The essential oils are a fairly expensive thing - but even the ones you get through at a rate of knots (eucalyptus, lavender, tea-tree all of which have antiseptic, anti-fungal or stain-removing qualities) take a few months to use up. And of course you don't need many - you get orange essence, and lime, and clary sage, and rosemary, and pine because they smell nice, not necessarily because they blitz germs. Lovely zingy lime and lemon on your worktops anyone?

And what of germs, I hear you say? Do these things actually kill them? Yes they do. And don't forget, we have a highly clinical view of what is necessary in germ-killing. Bacteria have to be kept at low numbers, not completely obliterated. And just exactly how much raw chicken do you actually spread on your fingers and wipe on your child's face before smearing a pooey nappy on your high chair tray and feeding the child its tea from the floor?

I'm dead chuffed with all my cleaners, although The Husband is a saboteur. I find sneaky boxes of washing powder sitting about, and when I accused The Saboteur of trying to undermine my housewifely pride by insulting my utility room with gawdy boxes of chemical toxicity, he peevishly stated that he didn't like that the washing balls have no smell. Bless his cotton socks. So now, I put a macho blend of rosemary, clary sage, pine and lemon in the conditioner compartment when washing The Saboteur's pants, to give his Y-fronts freshness on the fragrance front. He doesn't actually wear Y-fronts; that was purely for the sake of the prose. It was panty-hose prose.