But why do you not reuse towels? And why do you need so many at a time, and such huge ones?
X2
We do reuse to some extent. We reuse bath towels 2-3x before they get swapped out. I'm kind of grossed out by the idea of using them more than that - so I don't. (Not that I think those who reuse for a week or more are gross. It's a personal preference thing.) All our towels, even the non-bath-sheets, are large because up until about a year ago, there was a lot of mr-and-mrs-j to dry, you know what I mean. I like to be able to wrap the towel around myself and not flash the world, so when I was heavier, I preferred bath sheets because towels just didn't meet in the middle. Now that I'm thinner, I still use the bath sheets because, to be honest, I really like them. I use two towels at a time - one for my hair and one for the rest of me. R only uses one. Hence the 6-9 towels a week between the two of us.
I don't reuse my swim towels because they either stink like dirty lake water or chlorine - neither of which is pleasant. Plus, they get wetter than a regular shower towel (from the suit, I guess).
On a side note: I think I cursed myself by asking how to do less laundry. Last night, Hobbes went upstairs about 10pm and barfed ALL OVER the (clean-that-day sheeted) bed - so I had to change the sheets, the comforter, everything. LOL There's two extra loads this week. *sigh* I can't freaking win.
1. 2 people, 3 dogs 2. 3-4 loads a week, at most. 3. We do our own laundry 4. He dry cleans his work pants 5. I rewear a lot of my stuff, makes it last longer and cuts down on laundry 6. Towels are reused all week, except his workout towels 7. I don't seperate anything - it all goes in on cold. DH seperates out his whites. 8. I hate laundry (well, all chores) and do as little as possible
I feel like we do a ton of laundry, but I also have a 6 month old who spits up on everything.
On a typical weekend, we do: 1 load whites (includes sheets) 2-3 loads darks (includes sheets and/or towels) 1 load cat mats 1 load DH's dress shirts
But I guess based on what I'm seeing from this post, we don't actually do that much laundry. I do our duvet cover once a month and curtains every 3-4 months, but other than that, I don't do too much. We rotate out towels every 2-3 days as well since our rental bathroom has a crappy little vent and towels just don't dry out after a couple of uses.
I'm sure I'll get crucified for my water use, but we do:
1 small load each day (Monday through Friday) - DH has a job where he can go through 2-3 changes of clothing a day and his work pants are special enough (and expensive enough) for his line of work that we don't own 15 of them. I wash the colors together with cold water. Like a PP said above, not separating them out hasn't killed me yet...especially since I wash darker, new items (potential bleeders) as soon as I buy them 1-2 times.
1 larger load of whites on the weekends that includes our sheets.
* I wash special items like rugs and such as needed every few weeks. Comforters as I see fit.
Sure, I could combine these M-F loads into 3-4 bigger loads a week. But DH's job really mandates these pants get washed frequently. Plus it takes me 10 minutes at the most to put up the daily laundry load after they're dry.That fits nicely into my cleaning schedule.
I reuse my towels a few times before washing -(after washing -you are clean- right? The towels don't get dirty from one use. If you are rotating towels out ever 2-3 days, how are you getting so many of them in the wash? sheets are washed weekly, but matress pad and coverlet about once a month (sometimes ever other month)
Two people & most loads are on the small size, but I don't like to mix for some reason so per week: 1 jeans 1 dark colors 1 light colors 1 delicates 1 whites - every other week 1 towels - every other week 2 sheets/duvet - every other week or so
We do a load of work clothes and 2 misc loads a week. We used just stopped cloth diapering, but that was 1 load a week too (didn't cd on the weekends).
Post by heliocentric on Apr 12, 2013 9:23:44 GMT -5
There are only 2 of us and we do a lot of laundry, too. I often stuff our large washer and I don't separate things as much as others seem to. Between work clothes, casual clothes & exercise clothes it adds up. Each week we do:
1 load white 1-2 loads dark / dark colors 1-2 loads light colors 1 load delicate/hand wash
As needed, definitely not every week: rugs rags/dog towels, etc. kitchen towels & napkins (we use cloth) curtains bedding
We're a family of 4, and I usually do about 4 or 5 loads of week. The only things I separate out are cleaning cloths and rugs. Most of that is children's stuff. They are dirty, dirty, little creatures and I can't even figure out how they go through 3x as many clothes as H and I in a week. We have a large capacity washer