The bain of my stay at home existance. The thorn in my side, the pain in my domestic aspirations. Ugh the trials of my laundry. Yes, I am going to lament the state of my laundry.
Ok, the reason I decided to write about this started with a comment somone made to me recently when they found out how large our family is.
"So...what is that like? Like, if your making dinner how many chickens do you cook?"
This is my reality, so....it's my reality, but many people just can't imagine what its like to live with so many people. So I have decided to do some posts on just what its like from a logistics standpoint to have a super sized family.
The first thing I will tell you about my laundry is; it is insane. I'm not trying to exagerate but really insane.
We produce at least 15 pairs of dirty underwear everyday. Ok, your doing the math, 11 people in the family...15 pairs of undwear? I'm not going to shock you with the details, lets just say that kids are gross, especially the ones that are potty training, and those recently potty trained..ish.
105 pairs of underwear a week, holy bleach loads daddy. Can you say comando Fridays?
154 socks per week!
When I first started staying home I very quickly decided that if the kids could find any two clean (or reasonably clean) socks on their own then that was good enough for me. The thought of matching socks and delivering them back to assigned drawers, fantasy. So matching socks and my kids, nope. Maybe on Sundays and special occasions, somtines if we are going to someones home that has a shoes off policy. If I say your socks need to match, they ask what's the holiday. Our socks go directly from the dryer into a large yard waste sized bin for communal storage and then its good luck to ya.
How many loads? 4-5 loads per day, ugh. The little ones rarly make it through the whole day without a costume change, then there are all the dance clothes, towels, sheets, and don't even get me started on why kids need to get a new dish towel every time they spill something in the kitchen.
I am awsome at getting the loads sorted, washed, dryed and then I have a problem. The folding, never enough time. We just call it "the pile" Dad I can't find my team jacket, pants, coat, bra, whatever..."check the pile" This is the 6 foot tall mountian of clean stuff that grows outside the laundry room door during the week. (at this point, please someone say they can relate to this) It grows and spreads down the hall as the kids paw through it looking for school clothes until Saturday when we get to this......
Note, that this pile does not include any blankes, sheets, towels! The kids always fold anything square or rectangular first even though I will never let them wear a comforter to school....or a wash cloth for that matter.
So there it is, super size family laundry. I don't have a double set of washers and dryers so my fantsies of clothes that you just compost after one use, colors that don't bleed, kids that don't spill or pee, cotton that doesn't shrink and tropical climates where all but the minimum of clothes are usless, will continue.
Oh, and I cook 3 whole chickens at a time.
