Lovely Laundry ~ Remembering Grandma's Way
April 11, 2008
Today, Colleen is hosting the first Simply Lovely Fair of the Spring ~ the topic this week is Laundry. How can we make laundry less of a dreary chore and more of a pleasant endeavor?
I've been thinking a lot lately about how I manage my household, and as I do, I find myself remembering the way my grandmother ran her own home. She probably didn't think about it half as long or hard as I seem to - and yet, her home was tidy, clean and comfortable. She was always on top of things, and her family's needs were always met. I can stand to learn from her example in so many areas, but for today, I'll focus on her laundry; she had quite a way with it ...
I happen to love doing laundry, though I do find it hard to keep up with. I love the way good, fresh laundry looks, smells and feels, and I love the way it serves my family. Laundry done well means drawers full of clean clothing, closets hung with neatly pressed clothes, and beds made with sweet-smelling linens. It brings comfort in both the physical and emotional sense of the word. Plainly put, when the laundry is caught up, my maternal psyche can rest. :)
When I was young, I watched my grandmother work absolute magic with laundry. She had a way - a system I guess - of keeping up with it all. First of all, her laundry never piled up. As with the rest of her household, things in the laundry area were kept tidy and running smoothly. The area was in the basement - a small, but efficient space. The ironing table was always set up, ready to go, just beneath a clothesline where Gram would line dry many items inside. (There was also an outdoor clothesline just outside the cellar door.) In one corner stood the freezer (filled with berries, pie crust and applesauce, etc.) and in the other stood a utility sink, where items could be rinsed out and where Grandpa could wash his hands when he came in from the garden. A tall set of shelves held the few items she needed for laundering. She didn't experiment much - she didn't need to. She didn't waste a lot of time looking for the perfect thing, she went with what was useful and good and made it work for her. And for her it was a box of powdered Tide and Bounce dryer sheets. I think there was some kind of stain remover, and I remember a Fels Naptha bar as well as a glass shaker for ironing. I have that glass shaker on my shelf now - of course I have no idea what to do with it. ;)
Her linen closet (a thin, tidy cupboard in the hallway) was a sight to behold: neatly stacked medical supplies, bedding, towels and paper goods. So much was stored here, and yet never too much. Her bedding was most notable, though. I never slept so well as I did in a bed made up by Gram. In the summer, the sheets were cool and smooth as silk; in the winter, the flannel blankets were soft as butter.
I never gave any of this much thought until I was older; as a child you take all these things for granted. But when I was first married, and learning how to manage a home on my own, my grandmother would often take home a pile or two of our laundry to do for us. She would return it to us, and we would hardly recognize our own clothing! It was so clean, soft and smelling as fresh as a new spring day ...
So I began to pay attention. :)
Here are a few notes on laundering, a la my Grandma's ways ~
~ Never over-fill your washer.
~ Check clothing before adding to washer (empty pockets, etc.)
~ Let the washer fill up a third of the way; then add your detergent.
~ Once detergent has worked into the water, then start adding clothing.
~ Don't let clothes sit in the washer; set a timer if you need to.
~ Shake out each piece of laundry before tossing it in dryer.
~ Hang what you can on a clothesline (inside or out).
~ Don't let clothes sit in the dryer; retrieve and fold them promptly.
~ Choose your clothing and linens wisely; you don't need a lot. Buy well made items that will wash well and last.
Now, here are a few notes about where my laundry can stand improvement:
~ We need to make less of it. I only have three children and yet it seems like I do laundry for a football team! (Of course they're boys and I think boys count twice when it comes to laundry.)
~ To make less laundry we need to own less clothing. I must find time to weed out our clothing and fill bags for donation. We also need to be better about addressing clothing more responsibly at night; if something is not dirty, it should be put away properly, not left underfoot or in a pile.
~ Our clothing and linen storage areas really need to be overhauled ~ closets, bureau drawers and seasonal storage boxes. This is a (huge) topic for another post.
~ I need to be better about keeping up with the laundry process. I tend to start laundry and then not complete the cycles. So, all too often I have laundry that needs to be rewashed or laundry that sat in the dryer and got cold and wrinkled. I go back and forth on how to address this. I sometimes think doing one load each day of the week is the ticket, but I feel maybe one or two full laundry days a week is better - days I know we'll be home and I can keep up with each part of the process. Using the kitchen timer is so helpful, and having an area to spread out and fold, too.
When I'm feeling brave, I will photograph my laundry area, a project in progress. Bill is re-doing the kids' playroom, and at the same time we are re-vamping the laundry and pantry areas. It will be nothing fancy or formal, but simple and efficient (and lovely) - just like Gram's I hope. :)
If you're looking for more thoughts and ideas on laundry, I hope you will stop by Colleen's Fair today! I know I will be there later, with a cup of tea in one hand, and a pencil in the other - ready to add tips to my list. :)
Happy Friday, my friends!