The Importance of Your Daily LOL

I was recently reflecting on a time in my life when I felt totally inundated by our laundry situation. I thought about our overflowing hampers when I wasn’t even home. I felt panicked when we realized we were running low (or completely out of) clean essential garments. These feelings often led to paralysis and sometimes we wouldn’t do laundry for up to two weeks at a time. My overwhelm would overflow into casual conversations and I would find myself literally airing out our dirty laundry problem to others. Even though it was embarrassing to admit, I hoped to find some humor in the situation, maybe some miraculous tips, but also someone else who could relate. Can you?

My initial solution was to acquire more essentials so that we didn’t run out so frequently. I’ll be honest with you though, doing so enabled us to put off laundry even longer, and our piles (and stress) only grew bigger... and when everything was actually cleaned and put away, our drawers and closets were stuffed!

Out of desperation, I initiated a zero-risk experiment that mimicked the laundry systems from some of my favorite YouTubers, Dawn the “Minimal Mom” and "Diane in Denmark." For us, implementing aspects of their combined systems included completely eliminating hampers, significantly reducing the family’s inventory of clothing and doing laundry more frequently. I specifically remember my husband’s deeply skeptical face when I suggested hiding the hampers for a few weeks - they were such a crutch for us - but we were sick of the laundry stress so he hopped on board and we gave it a go.

We took our hampers out of our bedroom and laundry room and collected out of season clothing. We also boxed up any items that we felt confident about decluttering and put everything into the guest room closet to keep it out of sight but within reach should we discover we actually needed or missed an item. We also decided to place our hangers backwards in the closet and once an item was worn, we would hang it normally. Doing so gave us a visual as to what we were wore and what went untouched overtime.

At the end of each day, we collected any dirty clothes into one laundry basket and brought them directly to the washer machine. We would then start a load first thing in the morning and ideally have it switched over to the dryer before we needed to leave for work. When we got home, we committed to put away our clean laundry as part of our evening routine and would start over again.

Wow. The burden that was lifted after doing this for just a few weeks was truly tangible. I was amazed that we were able to say goodbye to our hampers and boxed-up clothing with peace and confidence. We were also able to make honest decisions about the clothing we never reached for - the ones that were stuffed at the bottom of the drawer or still hanging backwards in the closet. On another note, I actually enjoy doing the laundry now. I never thought those words would come out of my mouth, but I do feel a real sense of accomplishment in finishing a load, it just happens in the background of our every day lives now. I used to save the week's laundry for Saturday mornings, but now we don't do laundry (or any other chores) on Saturdays because we reserve that day for Sabbath rest as a family.

I want to briefly touch on the additional benefit of living with a simplified wardrobe. When you have your entire wardrobe comprised of only your favorite pieces accessible to you all the time, you naturally don't need as many clothes. As a result, you can begin focusing on making your collection a collaboration of high quality pieces that express your true style. I no longer feel like I have full closet but nothing to wear. Getting dressed in the morning brings me joy, so stay tuned for a future post focusing more on cultivating an intentional wardrobe!

Before we go, I want to leave you with a few other laundry tips that I have learned along the way in the hopes that they are helpful to you:

• Cut your use of liquid detergent in half - it's highly concentrated and can actually leave residue on your clothing if you use too much - a bottle also lasts twice as long!

• If you have a front loading washer, put the nozzle of your liquid detergent directly over the detergent drawer to prevent waste and mess. You can also wash your clothes with the plastic cup and detergent for the same effect

• Use powder detergent on hot loads of towels and sheets keeps the inside of your washer cleaner

• Use white vinegar instead of fabric softener - a more cost effective way to accomplish the same purpose without artificial fragrances (and no, your clothes do not smell like vinegar after)

• Sort and fold your laundry on your bed or dining table - this incentivizes you to get clothing put away quickly so you can use these surfaces for their intended purpose - resist putting folded clothes into a laundry basket

• Wash mixed color loads and light color loads with cool water and liquid detergent

• Wash delicate loads on delicate settings with liquid detergent and then hang to dry

• Wash towels and sheets with hot water, washing powder and white vinegar

• Do not overload your washer, keep at 3/4 full or less

So, the "LOL” in the title of this article does stand for "Load of Laundry,” but I also advocate that sticking to it allows for me to actually laugh out loud every day with a much lighter heart. I also want to remind you that my goal in writing about subjects like this is to challenge you to think about your processes with intentionality. We have a lot to take care of in our day to day lives, but there's no need to let something like laundry steal our joy!