Eliminating Unnecessary Housework: Laundry

TRUTH!

I'm not a laundry hater. Ok, putting it away is my down-fall but I actually love the sorting, washing and drying.

I read about this mom who stopped folding her cloth diapers and would just throw the clean ones into a basket - and I tried it and loved it. We have since stopped cloth diapering, but the idea of simplifying housework and figuring out necessary vs fluff (can housework be fluff? i'm thinking "yes") tasks has been worth reflection.

I realized that folding bath towels, however wonderfully warm and neat and nice they may be for a whole 1.7 seconds before toddlers descend upon them is a total, utter, waste of time at this point in life.

Enter this image:

Basket on left is all that I need to fold IF I choose not to include bath towels.
Baskets one, two AND three on the right is how much laundry I would have if I kept the bath towels in to be folded.

So, one basket of folding or three....
dooo do dooo do...
easy right?!

One basket, please!

And so all the bath towels are emptied into this large (FREE!) wicker basket some friends of ours demoted from their home. Happy to have it put to use here!

Viola! Less mess, less stress!

What are your tips for eliminating unnecessary work? PLEASE share!! This girl wants to know!

Thinking on a Monday...Always a Not-Good Idea that Means Rambling!

Monday is officially our Hangover day...hahahahaha!! STOP! NO! We don't get wasted every Sunday night.  Pinky promise.

It's just that I miss Tyler...and the kids miss him...and I miss happy kids (due to Dada's presence)...and order...and the rhythm of being with my soul mate.

So thusly (Wow I am SHOCKED that is a word) Monday is here known as our "Hangover Day" and because this schedule of laundering sorta had my type-A personality wigging-out if I was on the wrong load of laundry, Hangover Day can also be called Laundry Day or even Neglect-the-Entire-House-for-the-Sake-of-Clean-Underwear Day.

Quality time a la commode.

And how do I blog while amidst the throes of clothes and whiny (and feverish, today) children on Mondays...because I let them do things like this

macaroni flinging.  It's a lost art, people.

Did I tell you our latest news?!

We joined Sam's!!

I have sold my soul...to Wal-Mart corporation.

I still won't shop at Wal-Mart...but Sam's, you can be my hero bay-bayyyy!

*I think that I wish we had a Costco or a Trader Joe's, etc etc but all I got is Sam's-Mart and dat, ma cher, is what dis family done get!

They were mostly excited.  Rita kept exclaiming, "Momma! This is a beautiful grocery store! Thank you for bwinging (bringing) me to a beautiful grocery store!"

There ya have it - Sam's, the Beautiful Grocery Store.

Ok, but seriously.  Look at those faces.  Melting.  As nutty as they make me feel, these kids melt my heart and wring it out. All in a day.

Anne at MMD has a link-up for your bookshelf.  But seeing that our books are packed away in anticipation of selling this house and buying a new, one all before Easter...madness...moving on!...all I've got are my cookbooks.  But I think they will do.  I use them all, minus the "Sacred Feasts" - but that's sorta my goal, to make more soups, so the cookbook is a patient (and pretty) reminder.

Thanks for all the support and ideas when we were budget-busted last month.  We are again busted this month thanks to my klutzy tendency to react instead of act (sorry to let you down Auntie Leila!)...because hell-ooooo four pairs of glasses broken in two years....um, no, make that ONE year...means only one thing: get some contacts, sista! And in humble (ACTUALLY SUPER EXCITED!!!!) obedience to my husband I am now wearing contacts.  It's like so miraculous and has eliminated just another one of those totally unnecessary why-have-I-been-doing-this-for-so-long battles.

But as Tracy pointed out, it takes a while to get the budget train on the right tracks.  We are making strides.

I'm so so so excited for Rachel of Intentionally Simple - they just announced baby number three!  Congrats and prayers your way sista! 

Speaking of budget and a simple momma:

For the FIRST. TIME. EVER. in our marriage we ended last month UNDER budget with $18 and some change.  Incredible.  Praise Jesus!  Hoping for the same this month - just gotta get to selling some stuffs on ye olde Craigslist, or something like that.  But first, the laundry.  

Happy Day to you!

P.S. I wrote this whole post and then realized Anne's link-up is not until Wednesday (I think I should make another cup of coffee!!!)  Case-in-point of why I should not think (or blog!) on Monday-Hangover-Laundry day.

Thanks for reading y'all! Muah!

Food-ish Things

First, Auntie Leila of {pretty, happy, funny, real} is ill. She has shared so much wisdom with me through her blogging and I know she would greatly appreciate prayers. Please remember her.

Farmer's market = carrots for Thanksgiving! Bingo!

Second, I've heard that you shouldn't double baking recipes because sometimes the chemistry can go wrong. Cue the runny cookies that ended up needing an extra cup and a half of flour and were miraculously squished and baked into a massive giant cookie cake. Sent it to work with the hubster. Great reviews from the manly work crew. Thank you Jesus for not wasting the butter!!!!! It's so dang expensive these days!!  (Cookies are GREAT for postpartum NFP!  Don't be afraid! Bake the day away!)

Third, I'm baking again (I guess the above gave that away, but anyway)!!
BREAD!!! Bread, at least weekly. Therapeutic and delicious. A pretty sure sign I am beginning to move out of post partum ah-my-life-is-a-wreck-what-am-I-doing-and-why-does-no-one-have-clean-underwear slump. Although I think my spiffy new laundry routine is totally thebomb.com and it does a good job keeping me on task. It's so great to just knead dough. Idk. I just find that extremely soothing.

Fourth, we have a visitor tomorrow!!! Yay!!! Jonah's godmother and we are pumped! My to-do is obnoxious and if I nail it, it will be awesome. If not, it will still be an awesome day.

On the agenda tomorrow are sugar cookies, pie crusts, pecan pies, a pot pie for supper, and lots of chopping and slicing veggies in advance for our cozy Thanksgiving meal at home.  Yes, I'm crazy.  Whatever. 

Fifth, I scored BIG at the grocery. Thank you Lord. Spare ribs for...(drumroll)...49cents per lb!!!! Markdown for a roughed-up package? Oh yes thank you!!!! Those puppies are fast asleep in our freezer!

Cell phone snapshot before entering Arctic freeze!

Sixth, have you read A Knotted Life? Great blog! Great humor! Bonnie is a hoot and she is totally not trying to impress or belittle any momma out there.  That rocks.  Check it out!

And there were potatoes too!  Roasted veggies on the Thanksgiving menu!

Seventh (don't really have anything to say buttttttt seven is God's perfect number!) Oh! I have something!
Yeast Bread Rolls! Tried making them and can I say 1. Easy peasy 2. Delicious

Yeast bread rolls...A-mazing! (In the freezer for our...you guessed it! ...Thanksgiving menu!

Eighth, ok, I know, passing God's number .. We had a play date today with all the kiddos from our birth class for Rita. She had a blast at the park! She could swing for hours, I bet! Sweet girl has always liked rocking, and it seems like swinging is glorified rocking!

Ninth, I'm totally out of control and loving it! hahaha! I LOVE my babies but co-sleeping part-time is working best for us.  Part-time = Jo starts off in the Moses basket next to us and ends up in bed like um, every night.  But the sleep I get on my own in great.  And if I'm missing my little buddy, I just reach on over, scoop him up and plop that chunky 15lb 9 oz boy next to me!  He is so chunky and cute!   So it's mostly full-time but it's great!

Really, I'm obsessed with these carrots.  Orange, yellow, white, and deep red.  Gorgeous.

Tenth, Good night!

"Hold you baby! Hold you baby"  Rita, you're amazing.  I love you.

Cloth Diapering: Not for Every Baby

We really love cloth diapering and it was wonderful with Rita (we had issues at night here and there, but nothing horrid).

When we introduced solids with Rita and I had to deal with real poop, (in the first trimester of my second pregnancy, mind you!) I waivered, but learned to use a piece of flannel for lining, which solved diaper cleaning issues.

Once Jonah was born and we were using cloth diapers at home, it became clear that his sensitivity to even a slightly damp cloth diaper produced a merry-go-round of endless diaper changing and restarting his morning nap. 

After our house was in a dismal state, meals were not prepared at home, laundry wasn't washed, dishes weren't clean, the baby was cranky and exhausted and most days I was a bitter angry mess, it became clear that something had to be done.

Upon evaluating our budget we discerned that the most inexpensive disposables would fit into our budget.  I am so grateful the Target Up & Up brand of disposable diapers is latex-free, perfume-free and (get this!) chlorine free!

It still makes me sick to see the waste we create.  It bugs me.  Our trash has to be taken out every other day rather than twice a week.  I'm adding to landfills and we literally throw money away.  Sickening.

So this past week I took down the diapers and added them to my new laundry routine.

The first two days were fine but on the third day Jonah kept waking and crying soon after falling asleep; so we entered into the merry-go-round yet again.  I totally got the blues that day and not much more than diapering and soothing happened.

And so for now I'm really truly cleaning the cloth diapers up.  I'm still doing the early beginnings of elimination control (EC) with Jonah, and that makes me feel better.  Hopefully EC will get us using less disposable diapers!

And I will close with a classic Cajun twist:

A Boudreaux and Thibodeaux Joke

Found on The Daily Iberian

Submitted by Mike Bernard

One morning, Thibodeaux went to Boudreaux's house to pick him up for work and found him with cloth diapers drying on lines strung from post to post, and his son was playing with blocks on the porch. "Man, What happened to Marie? Why she's not taking care of T-Boy?", Thib asked.
"Mais, she's sick bad with the flu and she can't be around nobody, so I took off work to take care of her and the baby…this child must mess his diaper every 10 minutes! I don't know how she keeps up!" Boudreaux said as he pinned another diaper to the line.

Thibodeaux recognized the stress his friend was going through and offered some good advice. "Boudreaux, don't mess with these old cotton diapers while Marie is sick. I'm going to the drug store and buy you them disposable diapers…when the baby makes a mess, you that off, throw it away, and put on a new one…you don't have to wash nothing!" Thibodeaux came back with a box of disposable diapers and showed Boudreaux how to use them, then wished his friend luck and was off to work. After his day was done, he made a pass back to check on Boudreaux's situation. He found Boudreaux sitting on his porch smoking a cigarette and reading the paper…looking very relaxed compared to the scene that morning.
"Thibodeaux! Man, I can't tell you how much you helped me with them disposable diapers, that…it's the best thing since the clothesline dog chain.." As Thibodeaux listened to Boudreaux sing the praises of disposable diapers, a screaming mad T-Boy walked bow-legged onto the porch with his swollen diaper very close to dragging the ground.
"Boudreaux! You need to change that baby's diaper, yeah! There must be 10 pounds of mess in there for sure!" said Thibodeaux in disbelief.
Boudreaux lit another cigarette and said, "Don't worry, Tib…you bought the good ones…the box says they can take from 20 to 24 pounds!"

Happy diapering!  However you manage!

Laundry Day: Revisiting and Reviewing my Routine

Conclusion: The Routine Rocks!

Day one: I love this! Clean laundry is great and a good bit of it even found its way home. Good stuff. I knew I loved schedules!

Day four: Don't schedule play dates on laundry day.

Day five: Cleaning rags were in the mix with towels, so I did uniforms tonight. Maybe I should have the washer full of a uniform load for when Tyler comes home on Friday, add Friday's clothes and put to wash. Then, uniforms would be done for the weekend.

Day six: Bath and darks today, as darks were nearing the tippy top of their hamper section.

Day eleven: Fell behind, but it is encouraging to have an order of execution for the piles.

Day fourteen: No laundry piled up and no laundry done = SUCCESSFUL ROUTINE!

Related Post: Laundry Day: Creating a Rotation

Laundry Day: Creating a Rotation So My Husband Has Socks!

Source: via Suzette on Pinterest

People.  A man who works 55 hours a week seriously deserves clean socks.  No matter how many babies under two there are!

My husband rarely has clean socks.

Monday is laundry day and there is a second "floating" laundry day, but this laundry dilemma will  need a little structure to make clean socks happen.  I think the ambiguous laundry day is the reason that on Sunday morning I am hurrying into the laundry room to throw load after load of laundry to wash.  Not quite the best use of our free time with Tyler home from work!

So here is the rotation I will be trying out over the next two weeks.  On November 5th I will let you know how this worked out and any adjustments that were made/will be made at that point.

My ultimate goal is to not have to touch the washer and dryer on Sunday...hmmm...aspiring...and for my husband to always have clean socks (And no it isn't that we have too few.  He has over six pairs of socks!) Maybe I'm just an extremely naive young mother.  Time will tell!

Hopefully having a routine will allow me to line-dry more clothes, as I can plan around knowing what clothing is washed on certain days.  That would be so awesome.  Line drying is freeeeeeeeee!  And we love free. 

In the meantime, let's wash and roll!

Sunday
Retreat from the laundry (Hopefully!)

Monday (An Official Wash Day)
Lights
Darks
Reds (if enough, otherwise put with Darks)
Bath (towels, washcloths, hand towels, etc.)
Kitchen (rags, cloths, etc.)

Tuesday
Uniforms (Tyler's load - this is also any seriously dirty clothes that might not be uniforms)
Special (anything that requires more thought than "dump, wash, dry")

Wednesday
Darks
Bath

Thursday (Unofficial Wash Day)
Lights
Uniforms
Kitchen
Sheets

Friday
Cleaning Rags
Bath

Saturday
Bath
Uniforms

Do you have a washing routine or washing routine tips?  

Please share!  

I would love to know how women maintain peace with this never-ending chore (which I don't hate, just looking for a rhythm).

Double Duty on Laundry Day

Monday is laundry day around here...but sometimes that is a bit postponed by things such as this:

A kitchen very much in need of some love!

Funny thing is, this kitchen saw lots and lots of love this weekend.

Saturday I chopped and froze bell peppers, sweet peppers, green onions, garlic chives, collard greens and onions.  For raw veggie eating I chopped a blend of bell peppers and cucumbers.  There are also bags of sweet peppers ready for the munching.  There is chopped squash ready for baby food making  (trying to plan in advance as Jonah will probably start tasting/eating table foods right after the holiday season ends...and I'm not expecting squash to be at market in January or February) or it will be used for a squash soup.  Just have to see how the week progresses.  Baked a butternut squash and froze the meat for baby food for Jonah.  It's a lot of talk about squash for babyfood - it's supposed to be very gentle on the stomach and intestines so I try to stock-up.

Then I made a chicken pot pie using leftover chicken, collard greens and mixed veggies.  Such a hearty meal and it easily hides awkward/disliked/leftover veggies.

I followed-up the pie with two quarts of chicken stock, which also made it into the freezer.

At mom's I used her fancy grater to shred zucchini for CHOCOLATE ZUCCHINI BREAD.  And shelled purple hull peas with my aunt.

Now our refrigerator and freezer have a nice stock of local veggies, most frozen soon after harvest, and that means more nutrients for our bodies! 

On Sunday night both of us wanted to get pizza from our favorite local pizza joint, but we held fast to the budget and I threw together a homemade chili.  It was delicious and used-up our leftovers from tacos on Friday.  Love not wasting food!

It was such a productive weekend and we spent lots of time with family.  I made a total wreck of the kitchen and did a ton of meal prep. 

So it will be a Monday of laundry and dishes, and that's fine by me!

I love having Monday as my laundry day, although with four people in our family I'm realizing I need a second day devoted to laundry.  Trying to decide between Tuesday or Thursday...  Having it at the beginning of the week gets my week moving at full force ahead and catching-up on laundry from weekend happenings (family visits, football games, festivals, etc.).  Recently I learned that before the precious (and I mean that so seriously!) washer and dryer women did laundry on Monday because it required them having time to rest before (Sunday) as it was such an exhausting task!  I love joining the ranks of women before me and doing laundry on Monday.  Getting all sentimental helps to fuel the fire of success for my laundry chore!

In need of laundry detergent? 
Check out THIS POST for my tutorial on how to make homemade laundry detergent.