L is for Laundry Day

Several years ago, I had a friend share one of her tips for successfully juggling three homeschooled children, their outside activities, and household chores. She designated one day each week as "Laundry Day" and didn't schedule any outside commitments on that day. It was her day to stay at home and make sure she got caught up on everything.

At the time, I laughed at the idea of being able to have one day each week that I could just stay at home. Lauren was still itty-bitty and had multiple doctors appointments each week. For years, I adopted another popular theory on taking the laundry demons -- wash a load or two every day. It worked, but I felt like I was always doing laundry.

About a year ago, I thought back to my friend's Laundry Day plan and tried it out. For some reason I took this picture about a year ago. Perhaps it was one of my first laundry days, and I was incredibly proud of the way all of the clothes were clean at the same time.

Over the past year, I've tweaked my Laundry Day approach. I realized from the start that I couldn't possibly get all of the clothes clean unless I was focused. I couldn't hear the dryer buzz and think, "I'll get to that in a few minutes." I have to pay attention to changing the laundry as soon as it finishes so that I don't waste any time.

I've recently added even an extra challenge to my laundry day. I decided that it wasn't enough of a challenge to get all of the clothes washed, dried, and folded in a single day. What I really wanted was to have all of the laundry completely finished so that I didn't have to worry about it the rest of the week. For the past several weeks, I've decided not to put a new load of clothes in the dryer until the previous load has been folded and put away. Usually the dryer finishes ten to fifteen minutes before the washer does, and I have plenty of time to fold the clothes while they are still warm and wrinkle-free. It's just a matter of taking a short break from what I'm doing to go take care of them instead of putting it off just a bit longer.

The great thing about Laundry Day is that I only have to do laundry one time per week. I don't restart the washer because I left a finished load in there so long that it smells funny. I don't have wrinkled t-shirts that are a pain to fold because they've been in the dryer for a few days. The absolute best thing about Laundry Day is the feeling of satisfaction that comes from finishing the job and not having to worry about it until next week.

My laundry confessions are linked up with others that are Blogging through the Alphabet. This week Kelli at Adventurez In Child Rearing is hosting the link-up; be sure to stop by and see what some of my other friends found to share about.

Also, I blogged earlier this week about Lilla Rose Flexi-Clips -- two "L" posts in one week. If you haven't already stopped by to enter my giveaway, please do.