Do you remember the trick baby doll bottles? They look like they're full of milk until you turn them upside down. The bottle appears to drain empty, but it fills right back up when you turn it upright again. I've decided that someone has installed trick laundry hampers around here.
I'm going to be honest. I don't stay on top of my laundry every single day usually. However, this week, I decided to start each day by doing the laundry from the day before...thus keeping our laundry completely caught up. Normally, I would wait until someone runs out of something. Inevitably, it's towels. We own a LOT of towels, but they dwindle down to nothing in record time around here. So they are usually the trigger for a load of laundry. Socks and underwear are also usual suspects.
Each kid has a hamper in their room, along with hampers in both bathrooms and the utility room. It's pretty common for three of the five baskets to be full before I tear into the chore. You see, I hate to fold and put away laundry. More than that, I hate to iron. So I have to be in the right frame of mind to do my laundry efficiently. I am definitely one of those people who occasionally leaves a load in the dryer and in the washer. I know the smell of clothes that have stayed in the washer overnight. It's not pleasant. I'm guilty of restarting the dryer a half dozen times, over a few days, to de-wrinkle the same clothes inside.
In light of my usual lackadaisical attitude towards laundry, I was feeling proud of my intentions to stay on top of this chore. Today is day four, and I'm feeling discouraged. I swear that my laundry hampers have that same trick effect installed as those baby bottles. I empty them into the washer, set them back up, and they instantly refill. I do not know how four people go through so many clothes! I should really say three people. I'm lucky to get Brady to change clothes from day to day. I am not even kidding when I say that Robbie might wear four different outfits every single day. Reuben is usually good for at least two. I'm guilty of a couple, myself. It's absolutely ridiculous.
I have such respect for the ladies of yonder years that had to do their laundry by hand. You can bet those people weren't wearing two, three, or four different outfits per day! If I had to do our laundry by hand, you had better wear every outfit at least three times before giving it to me to wash!
I understand why my grandma wore the same dresses over and over again. I spent a lot of my childhood in her home. Her life was very routine. Thinking back on it, I don't remember her doing laundry very often. She understood the value of wearing something until it truly needed cleaned. Some of my fondest memories of her home are centered around her yearly cleaning of her rag rugs. She had hand-made rag rugs scattered around her house. Once a year, she would take them down to the basement and wash them with her old wringer washer. I LOVED that washer. It was PINK! It was the only time she would use it. She had a standard washer and dryer for regular laundry, but she kept her wringer washer in order to wash those rugs. We'd drag out the old metal wash tubs to wash them by hand, then the wringer would be used to squeeze out the excess water. I can still remember watching her feed those rugs through the wringer, only to catch them on the other side. We'd take them out to the clothesline, which seemed a mile long, to hang them to dry. I so wish that I had that washer today. When she had to sell her home, one of the other family members got it. What a treasure it is!
Over the few minutes it has taken to write this, I've realized that I shouldn't be complaining about doing my laundry in my modern convenience washer and dryer. I should be thankful that I have such luxuries. I guess I shall go for now and see to those clothes in the washer!
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