laundry!

[itsrtimedownhere]

pretty soon it's going to be air conditioner time again. ugh. the forecast is 97 for tomorrow. 

last year, to save some money on our electric bill, i started doing all our laundry by hand.

i really fell in love with it! i bought an old fashioned laundry wringer (craigslist) and washboard (etsy). i already had a really great laundry rack (ikea) and a big party drink/ice bucket (walmart). i made a huge batch of laundry detergent about a year ago i'm about 2/3 through it now.

here's what i do:
- first thing in the morning, i gather all yesterday's clothes in a laundry basket.
- i put a scoop of soap in the bucket and dissolve it in a couple inches of water.
- then the clothes go in and i fill the bucket up the rest of the way with water.
- i mix the laundry with my hands. everywhere says to do it for "about 2 minutes." i lift it and plunge it back in the water 60 times. it's easier for me to do it that way. *shrug*
- then i let it soak until after lunch
- after lunch, i lift/plunge the laundry 60 more times
- use the washboard for extra dirty stuff
- then i run the clothes through the wringer haphazardly to get the soapy water out
- i dump the soapy water, put the wrung clothes back in and refill the bucket with rinse water
- 60 lift/plunges to rinse
- i fold the wet clothes and run them through the wringer (this makes folding clothes later way easier)
- then hang them on the drying rack
- in the morning, i fold them and start over!

i suppose it seems like a lot when it's all written out.  it's really not though. 

[kandice]

That's kind of rad.  I wouldn't mind giving it a go once or twice.  It would help me be more organized, that's for sure (as right now I'm on my last pair of pants, have diapers in the washer, and an overflowing hamper of towels!).

[MommyPants]

Do you do diapes by hand too, Laura?  That is really cool!  I'd love to drop our utility bill some.  But doing it all by hand sounds really intimidating...   

[itsrtimedownhere]

we don't have any babes in dipes right now.  noah's been out of diapers during the day for about 10 months and entirely for about 6 months.

but when he was, he never really pooped in them so i did wash them by hand.

we do use family cloth though and i hand wash them too.

[MommyPants]

Not sure I could go there. 

[itsrtimedownhere]

you could try just the kids clothes a few times. they are little and easy to do. 

[MommyPants]

The kids clothes I might be able to do.  But probably not at this point in my pregnancy.  I am just tooooooo tired to add in something else right now.  However, if it were planned and figured out ahead of time, I could see doing that.

[kelly s]

it's that time of year to use the clothesline   we have a small, retractable one.  Perhaps we'll get a bigger one...i'll put it on dh's list...

[itsrtimedownhere]

we have this drying rack. i love it. we're in a condo, so we can't hang a clothes line. i wish we could though.

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/50095091

[MommyPants]

Very cool drying rack!  I'd love to see pics of it in use.  We have an old school wooden one that we use all the time.  In the winter we set it out in the bathroom or a bedroom with the sweaters on it, and in the spring/summer/fall it goes on the porch with things that need to be laid flat on it.  We do have a clothes line, but it has been down all winter (we moved it to make room for 2 swings in the tree) and Micah won't put it back up until after the tree trimmer comes and cuts down our big tree on Wednesday.  Not that I could be using it right now anyway.