I know that all of you have been waiting on pins and needles for the secret I have been keeping on how to have an empty laundry basket a huge majority of the time!
So I won’t make you wait any longer. But first let me tell you what WASN’T working for me.
“Laundry Day” in our house used to be on Monday. It was the day that worked best for my work schedule when I was still working outside the house and it allowed us to start out the week with clean laundry. I would do 5, 6, or 7 loads that day for a family of 2. 4 loads of clothes – 2 dark loads, 1 light colored load, 1 load of whites, a load of towels, and a load of sheets or rugs. I didn’t mind WASHING the laundry at all or even transferring it from the washer to the dryer. But that is where my enjoyment stopped and the disaster started. I despised the FOLDING part of “doing laundry” especially when I had a laundry basket (or TWO) of clothes to fold.
All those clean clothes got tossed load after load into the laundry basket (a few got hung to dry.) I always intended to FOLD and PUT AWAY the laundry that day too. But it just never happened. Laundry would be done later in the day and I would be downstairs by that time for the evening busy working or spending time with my husband and I would just forget about it. Sometimes the laundry even made it from the basket to the bed. And when we finally headed to bed this is what would happen.
(source)
Ok, actually the pile was so big, it just got pushed into the floor. And for the next several days, we got dressed out of the pile on the floor. Until I got tired of that or needed to vacuum and it got tossed BACK into the laundry basket(s). Please tell me I am not the only one that has done this??
Then it was laundry day again and yet another 5-6 loads got added to the pile on the floor overflowing laundry baskets. By this point, we had no clean socks or underwear left in the drawers and we were digging every day to find sock matches or clothes to wear.
Finally I would get fed up, dump all the clothes on the bed (ok, usually it was TOO MUCH to fit on the bed at one time) and fold and put it all away. 2-3 weeks worth of laundry and it would take me over an hour to fold, hang, and put it all away. And. I. hated. it. (Sorry, no pictures of this… way to embarrassing to share.)
I hated the mess, hated living out of piles and laundry basket, hated that I seriously thought about buying my husband enough pairs of sock to last for 3 weeks so I didn’t have to feel guilty for him searching for socks in the pile every morning, and in general I hated laundry!
(source)
Until 2013 started. I was more determined than ever to work on being a better housekeeper, to keeping our home neater, to keeping our bedroom neater.
I don’t know how I came to this revelation, but one week in early January I got all the laundry folded and put away. And the next day when we had enough clothes to make a load, I went ahead and did that load, FOLDED it, and PUT AWAY that one load. I guess I had heard people talk about doing laundry every day but didn’t think for our family of 2 or our lifestyle that it was something we should do. But after only spending about 5 minutes total folding and putting away that ONE load of laundry and having every piece of clothing (except what we were wearing) clean, and put away – I felt relieved and excited! This could work!
So there’s my secret… I do ONE load of laundry every day. From start to finish – washed, dried, folded/hung, and put away.
So this…
happens 90% of EVERY DAY in our home!
Here’s some more tips:
- Our family consists of my husband and I. But we have some extra people staying with us right now. When our household is back to just the two of us, I may not need to do a load every day. I may only need to do a load every other day. (We only wear one pair of clothes each day normally.) I would say for a family of 5 or less, one load a day should work (teenagers=larger clothes or multiple outfit changes may change that). If you have 6 or more in your family, you may have to do 2 loads of laundry a day.
- The load I am washing/putting away sometimes is 2 different loads. Since all the dirty clothes happen at night when clothes are taken off and pj’s put on, I will usually start a load right then and add any kitchen towels, washcloths, etc. from the day too. Then the next day, in the morning, I will dry and put away that load and then wash another load that evening. Make sense? Other days, I may wash, dry, and fold the SAME load in one day. Just depends on when I have a full load and what else is going on that day.
- I still have so called “laundry day” on Monday (or another day that works for me) as I usually do 2-3 loads that day. 1 load of clothes, 1 full load of towels/rugs, and 1 set of sheets/blankets from 1 bed. Still not bad as towels and sheets were never a chore for me to put away. Again depending on your family size/amount of clothes you may be able to throw towels and sheets in with your regular laundry and not have extra loads.
- Doing laundry every day will allow you to have and need LESS clothes. You don’t need 15 pair or socks or 10 pairs of underclothes. Because only 1-2 pairs will be “in process” of being washed/dried/folded/put away at a time.
- If you have older children, you can assign them to help in this process. They deposit their dirty clothes in the laundry room every day and pick up their pile of clean, folded clothes in the laundry room and put them away themselves.
- If you work outside of the home – wash the load in the morning, and fold that ONE load in the evening.
So I went from having MOUNTAINS, yes mountains of laundry to fold…. to having ONE load to fold each day.. It takes me all of 5 minutes of my time to gather/wash/dry it (since the machines do all the rest of the work) and 5 minutes to fold and put it away.
And you know what . . . I don’t hate laundry anymore! We don’t live out of piles of clean clothes on the floor, I don’t feel guilty that my husband is digging for clean socks, and our room is MUCH cleaner!
This may or may not work for your family, may or may not work for YOU. But I challenge you to just give it a try. Get caught up on laundry this weekend – yes, conquer those piles and get them washed, dried, and PUT AWAY. Then start out on Sunday or Monday by just doing the dirty clothes from that day from start to finish! I try to go by this rule: I don’t put another load of clothes into the dryer until the load in the dryer is FOLDED and PUT AWAY. Don’t put those clean clothes into a laundry basket and walk away!! That is how the mountain begins! 
I have gotten behind 2 times since I started and had 2-3 loads to fold and I am sure you will too. Just start again – get it all folded and put away and begin again the next day doing ONE load.
Want to read some more about this method?
- Leah at Embracing Grace posted about how to move mountains of laundry using this method.
- Clean Mama posted about the How and Why of doing laundry every day.
And I love using my homemade laundry detergent each day! It smells so good and is super cheap!
And if you want a peek into where I do all this laundry, check out my laundry room house tour post and see all the plans I have for making it a room I love and that functions for our family.
I love this vinyl saying! May have to order it and add to my laundry room re-do!
So who thinks I am a total slob for living out piles of clothes on the floor? (Don’t tell me! …unless you do the same! :)
Who does the “one load of laundry every day method” and LOVES it? (and why did no one tell me about this method before?)
Anyone up for trying the “one load of day method”? Would love to hear about it and if it changes your life like it has mine.
About Christina
Love it! So simple and yet (confession here), so unknown to a “pile maker” like me (too). I’m gonna try to do this – really!
[BTW - I do buy my hubby 21 pair of the same socks, just to make MY life easier. He has one drawer devoted to socks. And I NEVER have to match them. He just grabs 2 and they are always a pair! I started doing this 20 years ago and still love it!]
Totally life changing, and I’ll never go back!! Our whole family is far less frustrated now that we always have clothes to wear. lol I just still can’t believe that I went this long without realizing there was a better way. I know one thing- I’m going to train my daughter in this method- hopefully she will never have to get overwhelmed by her own clothing. lol :)
(Thanks for the shout out, btw)
Leah recently posted..What Mama Did (Five Minute Friday)
I am definitely going to try this! I’m guilty of the “mountains of laundry in a giant pile and digging around to find clothes” thing. And then every few weeks folding and putting away. This is awesome! Thank you!
Finally, a kindred spirit who does exactly the same thing! Right even down to the buying socks part :) I am going to do this from now on. Now I just have to start with the giant pile of clothing on the floor at the foot of our bed and fold that. It’s so simple, but thank you for being open & honest (because you are definitely not alone in this area!).
So when washing for only 2 people, do you really throw ALL clothes in the same load? Jeans, blouses, whites and colors all in one? And how do you justify running less than full loads? Maybe I’m too concerned about the saving energy part, but I definitely wouldn’t want to wash work clothes and jeans and sweatshirts and towels all together.
Hi Lisa – I have two people and on the best of weeks I do about 1 full load a day. (sorry in adv gonna be long!) Due to my skin allergies I wash our clothes separately. Our clothes only touch when we hug and while sleeping :-) Anyways – I came across this one load a day thing about 6 months ago on Pinterest. So, I checked to be sure we weren’t running too low on anything and I did one load of clothes for him and the sheets (it was time). From that day on I did one a day – his 4 compartments first (I’m currently a housewife and don’t go through as many sets of clothing as he does) At the end of the week, Everything had been washed and the compartments were filling back up. I wash sheets and towels and misc blankets on Mondays now and I take whichever compartment is full the other days. Now since I don’t wash our clothes together, there are days that I’ll do two loads. But generally it’s only the one. And the only time I do a small load is when his workout clothes don’t make it to the hamper after they’ve dried. (he keeps them in the guest bath to dry so I don’t have to smell em! :-) I hope you find a method that works for you so you don’t have the mountains of laundry I used to have!
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I’m with you! Actually, I don’t mind doing laundry, but I want to do it and get it done! Doing laundry every day would do me in! :) Often, if we don’t have plans on a Friday night, I’ll do it all Friday night, then I have the rest of the weekend to be Laundry-Free. Yippeee!
Yes Yes Yes!!! I totally agree with your method!!! I used to save all of the laundry for one day also – and we’re a family of 6!!!! It would take me at least 3 days to have it all done, and another few days before it was put away. I hated the giant loads, and more than anything I hated sorting socks and underwear for 4 kids!!!! It took me forever. Now I have 3 laundry days, (2 people per day) and I finish it the same day (usually put away too!)
SO much better than ONE laundry day!!!
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There are only 2 of us left, and I do laundry when the basket is full. I will put the whites in a basket in the laundry room and do that load when it is full, my husband’s work clothes in another basket waiting for a full load and the rest go in the wash. So I only need to do one load about every 2-3 days! After raising 5 kids, this is like heaven.
Debbie :)
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mmmm….I would think maybe you are a mouse at my house. I like to do loads at night and then it’s ready to dry when I get home from work or . . . on the rare occasion we get up early, I can throw it in the dryer then. We still have too many clothes. I keep telling my daughter I need to set the timer and do 15 minutes in my room and the guest room!! Thanks for all your share. Enjoy your blog!
Hmmm…may have to give this a try! (and you’re not alone…my recliner has clean, unfolded clothes piled on it as we speak and I’m guilty of leaving it like that WAY too often!) Thanks for the great tip! =)
Rachel recently posted..Five Minute Friday: What mama did (the embracing)
I love the sound of this laundry method. One load a day to fold actually sounds doable for sure. And with the addition of a new family member (any day) I could use a more effiecient way to do my laundry. Thanks so much for this post :).
Great idea! I usually wash our clothes as soon as the basket gets full. It makes it even easier just to wash all the colors together, although I wash new clothes separately if I think they might bleed. I also take all my husband’s dress shirts and pants to the dry cleaner’s. It’s well worth it not to have to iron:). I wash my young daughter’s clothes with ours, but as soon as my kids get to be teenagers, they have their own baskets, and wash their own clothes, including their bed linens and towels!
I really like this idea! I am one who actually enjoys laundry, but not the best at putting it away. Jason, my husband, says he has to play ‘hide and seek’ to find his clothes. I think I’ll give this method a try and see how it goes. Also, added with folding and putting away that day I will add ‘ironing’ to it because Jason needs ironed shirts each day for work and I am terrible about getting ironing done. Thank you for the idea!
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We are one in the same!!!!! My only job around the house is laundry and I despise folding. It’s worse than your situation. Family of 4 and crazy laundry. I even posted a pic on the blog of all the clean clothes heaps. The Hubs hates this about me. I’m going to try your method and see if it works for me. Thanks!!!!!
I’ve been doing one load per day for a couple years now. It hit me to do it that way too, after letting it back up for years. I have to be home more, though, and that might be a problem for women who work outside the home. I love hanging clothes on the line too, so I shoot for getting laundry washed and out in the sun early. It’s helps that I’m Florida. :-)
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I’ve also had the pile to search through and the laundry room floor covered in clothes. Its terrible!!! With a family or 4, I try to do one load a day and I find it nice.
I also wanted to mention leaving clothes in the machine over night or an extend period of time can cause bacteria and mold to start growing in your clothes. It starts within 2 hours. With the front loading machines its a huge issue and will cause mold to grow in your machine extremely quick. Once its inside your machine it can be almost impossible to remove. These two things had “forced” to me finish the load.
Oh yeah. I live in a one person household; I do laundry 2 a week – usually “storing up” towels and “heavy” items for the weekend and a load of work clothes gets done on a weeknight evening – small loads for one person. I’ve found that folding the laundry right out of the dryer, piece by piece, and putting it into the laundry basket to haul upstairs works best for me; otherwise the laundry would sit and cool in the basket and get all wrinkled. Taking it out right away and hanging it on hangers (for dress slacks, sweaters and blouses) or folding (sheets, towels, teeshirts, jeans, undies, etc.) takes 5 minutes usually and then I’m DONE. Glad to hear this method works for you too. It’s a good feeling when you take control of your laundry and it doesn’t take control of you!
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I love this method! It’s so much easier to put away small loads. People always look at me like I’m crazy if I say I do laundry every day, but it definitely works best for me!
Okay, I am that mom who does laundry only once a week. I hate laundry but hate folding more then anything. My question is when you do that one load a day are you separating colors or mixing. Thanks again:)
I tried that years ago and found I love getting it all done on Friday and Saturday. I dreaded facing laundry every day (isn’t that so silly?) now, we get a jump on laundry Friday, do the rest on Saturday, and only diapers or emergency loads get done though out the week. So glad you found a system that works!
Any tips for a renter who only has access to the laundry Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday? Also a family of 2.
Sometimes I do 1 load, sometimes 4 or 5, and sometimes none but I NEVER put a load into the dryer without first at least folding the previous load.
Great post! Your “before” story is totally my life! I do the exact same thing, but I’m SO going to try this every day method. Thanks so much for sharing!
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I have multiple piles of clothes to be put away as we speak. We have a cedar chest at the foot of our bed and it is ALWAYS covered in clothes. It would be nice to actually SEE that beautiful peice of furniture. I had tried 1 load of laundry each day but felt like I was ALWAYS doing laundry. I like your idea though of throwing the clothes in at night, then drying, folding, and putting them away in the morning. I think that’s what I was missing in my “routine”; a dedicated laundry time during the day so I was just thinking about that pile of clothes in the dryer all day until I finally got it out and taken care of.
April – I also wash the load at night and dry in the morning. My front loader has a “start” timer so we can set it to start 5 hours after we put it in so that it’s not sitting all night .
One other tip – we are a family of 4 and I HATE having to sort by person as I fold so each child gets 2 laundry days (Sun,Wed and Mon, Thurs) and the other days are reserved for grownups or household. Each child has to collect and put in machine and top off load with towels that may fit…. The front loader is great for this because the controls are easy for my short one to reach :-).. Now when the load is dry, I can scoop off the towels and I only have one person of clothes to fold – no sorting. (all the kids clothes are wash and wear and we wash in cold all together; when whites or lights get dingy I may do a mixed person soaking load to brighten)
If someone has to do a load on an “off day” they are doing it themselves and I do NOT fold it, they have to – LOL – they are MUCH better at planning their clothes now – ha ha!
Your washer must be much smaller then mine.
For two people, I do about 2 1/2 loads a week.
I can’t lie, I wash all our clothes in the same load: white, colors, etc. Although really, the only whites are the kids’ socks, and I just don’t care if they’re not perfectly white. They’re so often tracked in mud (two little boys), it seems insane to try to make them bleached all perfect again. All our sheets are colors, everything I wear is colorful – I just don’t wear white, really. I just throw everything in together and don’t worry about it. The only clothes that get washed separately are my husband’s work clothes, because he so often comes home covered in toxic chemicals (welder!).
I generally do a load every day, but I’m terrible about folding and putting away. It usually piles up in a laundry basket on top of the dryer. So bad. I do make the kids help these days, now they’re a bit older, they can fold their own (badly, but practice makes perfect) and put it away.
How would you recommend accomplishing this with a two year old and a 7 month old under your feet? I wash laundry every day ( 1-2 loads a day) and yet I still have mountains of laundry that never get put away. I try but between, tantrums, toddler mischief, feeding the baby, holding the baby, and everything else that comes with two under two, I just can’t seem to find 5 minutes to get that one load put away.
Thanks so much for this!! It’s working! Something so simple and yet profound. I shared this on my FB page as well.
With our family of 11 I have to do 3 loads a day to keep up. If I would do it all in one day I would be drowning. Thanks for the blog
I quickly read through some of the replies to this post, but no one mentioned what their bills were like doing laundry everyday vs. 1 day/week. How much of a jump did you notice in your monthly energy bills (water, hyrdo, gas)? Doing laundry everyday can’t be cheap, can it???
Family of 5. I start washing my clothes on Friday night when I start dinner and hang everything possible right out of the dryer, including T-shirts and jeans. I work out side the home. I don’t iron. Hahaha. I roll/fold undies and put away. The children do their own laundry, still hanging everything possible. Undies and sock, etc in drawers. A little each day keeps the sanity. Towels and sheets first thing on Saturday in between errands. Wash hubby’s stinky gym clothes alone, after the sheets, if they weren’t already done during the week. One pre-teen daughter will not put any thing away or put dirty clothes in her basket. A one child laundry mess maker.
Also, send the shirts out to be ironed. It is cheap for the freedom you get. Usually looks better too.
Hi Lisa, did your husband ever help out with the folding? I understand that both of you work outside the home, so wouldn’t you like help with the housekeeping? I sure am grateful that my husband and I do our laundry separately. Less loads to do for me, and more time to relax!
Hey, I live alone and laundry piles up!! One load a day is the only way to go…but even that eludes me sometimes. I wish I had started when I was younger and had more energy!
If you are just doing laundry for one – I would think 1 load maybe every 2 days would work. try it :)
I totally put my clean laundry either in baskets lining the end of the bed piled high, or on the bet to be pushed back into those baskets. I always have more baskets of clean laundry than dirty. it sucks! Maybe I should start doing this.
YES! totally try it! I thought I would HATE doing laundry “all the time” but honestly it takes so little time to throw 1 load in and then fold it when it comes out of the dryer – 5-10 minutes and NO baskets, no digging for clothes :)
My husband currently has 2 full baskets – about 2 weeks worth – of his own to put away and I just finished mine. And now there is more running. I will have to try this!
it has honestly changed my life! :) try it.
I have been doing one load a day after having the same revelation. It’s so easy! It’s not nearly as stressful and I definitely feel much less overwhelmed. However, I’m currently on Bed Rest and my hubby is now in charge of laundry…. we’ve moved back into piles of laundry in baskets.
yes, it is so much easier!! And you know what – at least you have clean laundry! :) I am sure hubby is doing his best to help :)
I have always done it this way. I get upset when there is a lot of clothes in my laundry room. Of course, when we return from vacation it is different. But most of the time I just do it daily!
yes, I am AMAZED how much better this system has been for me. I absolutely LOVE it! And it is inspiring me to keep other things up better too.
The best habit my parents taught me (we started doing our own laundry at 10) was to fold my clothes as I pull them out of the dryer. I have friends and family that are clean-pile makers but I can’t handle my clothes being all wrinkly and have always folded from the dryer. We have lights, darks, towels/sheets, and my husbands stinky cop clothes that I was separately. That being said, I need to be better about putting away my nice folded piles of clean clothes. I can’t justify a load a day though with electricity and water costs in Hawaii! I try not to let our hampers overflow though.
I only do a load a day if we have a full load. But right now with 5 people in our house – a load a day happens pretty quick with kitchen towels and other things thrown in. And we iron everything right when we are going to wear it. Our clothes used to be SOOO wrinkled after sitting in a pile but now since I am folding/hanging them pretty much right away, I am spending much less time ironing :)
Matching socks for my family of seven was a huge headache. Now everyone has several lingerie bags ($1 at Walmart) with their name on it for socks and undies.
so the method I came up with for our laundry is
Monday:Darks
Tuesday:Towels
Wednesday:Whites
Thursday: Colors
Friday:Rugs
Sat: outerwear and
Sundays are sheets and blankets.
We have a family of 7 :)
Hmmm I can relate.. :)
Except mine turns into piles on my ironing board. I have this craziness that doesn’t allow me to fold clothes on our bed (because of mites or whatever could be on it! Pet fur too!). So…I currently have my pile on my ironing board.
BUT I have always used your method. My problem is that I don’t get home from work until around 5, then I start a load… which takes HOURS because my dryer takes 2-3 cycles to actually get the clothes dry… so naturally it stacks up :(
Anyone know a solution to a not so good dryer?? I’ve tried cleaning out the lint. No luck!
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Erm forgot a part of that! I was going to tell you my usual schedule that I attempt to follow :)
I’m goofy and need things to rhyme so I remember… (does anyone else do this!?)
Sunday: Blankets
Monday: Darks/work clothes
Tuesday: Towels (rhymes so I remember!)
Wednesday: Whites (again, the rhyming)
Thursday: Lights or darks again
Friday: Bedding
Saturday: Leftovers
We have a family of just 2, also. BUT, we each go through 2 sets of clothing on work days and my husband is a policeman and he only has 2 uniforms to wear..so I have to wash those a ton!! and… I don’t ever iron :) haaa after going through the dryer 2+ times it never really needs it! BUT I will admit, I just bought my husband extra underwear last week because I can never seem to get his clean and put away fast enough! :P