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By lovely mama, August 8, 2009 5:54 pm

Something exciting has happened in my house lately!  I got a new washing machine.  It’s not just a washing machine though – it’s become a source of entertainment for my boys.  Witness my youngest Wild Thing, gazing intently at the mesmerizing spinning of the nifty new front loader.  He sat there for a good twenty minutes, repeatedly saying
Lookit, mama!  Is spinning!  Is spinning!
The (long) story leading up to the new washer coming to reside at our house is one that I won’t bore you with, except to say that it involved our old washer emitting copious amounts of smoke into the air and water all over my basement floor, the day before I was to leave with our four boys on a week-long mission trip (sans The Hubster!) while it held the sheets we needed for said trip hostage inside.  Good times!

Anyway, now that the new washer has come to stay, I have to admit that I’m enjoying doing laundry.  (I can say that only because I’m confident that The Hubster doesn’t read this blog and will not remind me I said it later on when there’s a mountain of laundry waiting to be scaled in the basement) Moreover, the new washer has enabled me to teach the older boys (who were not big enough to reach the top-loader before) to do their own laundry.  My, oh my, there is no sweeter sight that that of your young boys washing their own clothes!

Several folks have asked me recently (after hearing about the death of the old washer) how I manage to keep up on laundry for our tribe.  I don’t think my system is particularly unique, but  I thought I’d share it anyway in case it helps ya’ll out.  Anything that helps a fellow mama scale Mt. Washie!

We’ve got the boys sharing bedrooms, the eldest and youngest in one room, the two middles in the other.  Each room has a hamper, and there are three rules:

• if it’s not in the hamper, it doesn’t get washed
• if it’s on the floor, it gets tossed in the rubbish
• if you want your stuff laundered, bring your hamper down to the washer on your day

The eldest/youngest’s days are Monday and Friday.  The middle’s days are Tues and Friday. The Hubster and I have our own hamper and our stuff gets washed on Monday and Thursday Household Stuff (dishrags, washrags, towels, etc) gets a hamper in the basement and is washed on Wed, and sheets are done on Wed also.  Sound confusing yet?  It’s actually quite simple – having seperate hampers for each bedroommeans that sorting is a snap, because I’m only separating two people’s things instead of all six of us.  I don’t separate colors/whites, because I do all the wash on cold (except for the household stuff, which gets done on hot) If you’re keeping track, this means that I do about two loads of laundry every weekday, and get the weekends off.  When we’re in the midst of baseball season and have games three nights a week, this schedule gets thrown off a bit and I wind up doing a “sports” load almost every day, but I still manage to avoid laundry on the weekends
The bonus to doing it this way is that now that sorting is easier, I can delegate it to the older two Wild Things, and they are able to put away the laundry themselves, without getting frustrated.  Another great tip for those of you with multiple kids close in age – I use a “dot” system for organizing.  My oldest gets one dot (I use a black sharpie) on the tag of clothes, or the toe for socks, second gets two dots, third gets three, and (duh) fourth gets four.  This way, it’s easy to tell at a glance which Wild Thing the identical white socks belong to, and it’s not a hassle when things get passed down – I just add a dot each time!
So how do y’all organize your washing?  Do you have a system?  I’d love to hear about what works (or doesn’t work) for you!