Make Laundry Fun

With the mere mention of the word "laundry," you may just get a swift kick in the face. Well, perhaps not, but you are sure to hear some moans and groans. Doing laundry is the household chore that I hate the most. Over the past year, I have learned and put to use some tips that have helped me to enjoy - perhaps that's a strong word - doing laundry. I never doing laundry now and it is actually no longer my most hated chore.

The first thing you need to do to make laundry more fun is to start with a clean slate. If you have any laundry piles, go and wash everything right now. It won't be fun, but it must be done.

After all of your clothes are clean, stop putting your most used group of clothing (whites, colors, jeans, etc) into a laundry basket after they're worn. Instead, put them straight into the washing machine until the washing machine is full. In the meantime, you will have laundry baskets filled with the other categories of clothing. My family doesn't wear a pair of jeans once and immediately wash them. A good fluffing in the dryer makes them good for another time of wear.

When your washing machine is full, there's no sorting for you to do. Simply start your washer and you've got a lot of the work already taken care of for you. There's no sorting or pulling things out of pockets.

Once your most used group of clothing is washed, only dry half of that load at a time. Washing half of a full load helps to keep your clothes from wrinkling. This, in turn, means less work for you.

Whenever your clothes are done drying, remove them immediately and take them to your bedroom. Dump the clothes on the bed and find the items that you are most worried about wrinkling. If you don't at least lay them flat within the first few minutes, they could wrinkle from being bunched up. Things like jeans, underwear, and socks don't matter as much as t-shirts and button-ups.

Put some music on and don't sit down hunched over to fold your laundry. Instead, stand next to your bed and dance around. Standing while folding laundry definitely helps prevent back pains that are often brought on. I used to sit on the floor or couch and fold. I had the worst back pains while folding laundry, but now that I stand up it is much better. And the music helps to keep you entertained and focused on something else.

Another way to make laundry easier is to have only one type of sock. There's nothing worse than mating socks. It takes time and often you're left with tons of mismatched loners. Give all of your socks to the homeless and buy some new ones. They really aren't that expensive and it will save you much frustration. That way you don't even have to mate your socks (I still do, but it's nice not to have to). You can just throw them in your drawer and you'll know that you can always "grab and go." Of course, I still have some "special" fuzzy socks and such, but those are easy to find the mate to because they're usually so unique in pattern and appearance.

My last tip is to use hangers whenever possible in lieu of folding. If you have the closet space, skip the drawers. It saves time and makes for neater clothes.