It's only taken me 2.5 years, but I've finally realised there's one aspect of FLYLady that just does. not. work. for me. Laundry. The laundry thing, one load a day, just isn't me. I detest washing so much, I'd rather do it all in one hit than every day. I guess I've always known this. Even as a teenager living at home, I did my washing Saturday morning. First darks/colours, then whites, hung them out, brought them in, and ironed on Sunday night while watching the movie. Ok, yes, for one person that was enough.
There's four (soon to be five) people here, and apparently I'm the only person capable of washing. A fellow group member has indicated she is hiding a pair of undies and a pair of socks for her Hubby for when she gets really behind in the washing. I've now done that too.
But I like washing to be "caught up" regardless of the fact I know it never is. I would rather wash and wash and wash until it was done, then relax for a couple of days. Which is what I did this week. Feeling slightly overwhelmed because I hadn't washed for about 5 days, I had 3 nearly full loads of clothes to do. It wasn't overwhelming, in fact it was easy. I hang all our shirts up inside, which means I CAN fit 3 loads of other clothes on our tiny tiny clothes line. I can put that many clothes away in one hit. It's really not that many.
And then I thought back, the stories you hear of 'laundry day' and 'cleaning day' and 'shopping day'. I already have a shopping/errand day (Monday). And a study day (Friday). That leaves me with 3 days. Tuesday is my quiet, at home day. It will hereby be known as "washing day". Which leaves me with Wednesday & Thursday. Thursday has recently been my day for doing a kind of Weekly Home Blessing as the kids are usually at the most docile (read: exhausted). Ergo: Thursday will be now known as "cleaning day". Leaving Wednesday for fun!
What this also means is that, particularly as my pregnancy progresses, I will not (hopefully) be out more than one day in a row. I plan on scheduling the childrens swimming lessons this weekend for either Wednesday or weekend days (fingers crossed I can) and will try and schedule hospital appointments that day too (same town - saving myself a trip).
So now my rough weekly plan looks like this:
Monday - Library storytime, grocery shopping, errand day
Tuesday - Washing day
Wednesday - Fun day!
Thursday - Cleanng day
Friday - Study day
Saturday - garden & extra washing as needed
The primary focus of cleaning day is the floors and bathrooms, and I've allocated different rooms to different days. For example: Monday is grocery shopping, so my focus room for Monday is obviously the kitchen. Tuesday being washing day, the focus room is the laundry and main bedroom and walk-in-robe. You get the idea. As I'm washing I'm spending a lot of time in the laundry anyway, so an extra 5 minutes here or there will keep it looking tidy. Same with our bedroom.
What do your weekly plans look like?
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I think you're very brave allocating a day to laundry. I have a "theme" to each of my days but washing gets done pretty much every day. I can handle a load or two but couldn't face a whole day of it. :-) I hope your plan works well though - I find having a bit of an idea where my focus is each day really helps (well, some days nothing helps but I'm sure you get what I mean).
September 6, 2007 at 2:52 PM
I know what you mean. I just find once I start washing I don't stop until it's done.
Forgot to mention I'll do sheets and towels on Thursday too, as part of the 'cleaning' thing.
Obviously this is loose, but I think the washing thing will work better for me. I actually don't mind doing a huge pile of laundry if I don't have anything else to do, but I hate standing outsdie every bloody morning hanging washing out. Bah!
September 6, 2007 at 3:29 PM
I don't really have a weekly plan as such but on Mondays I do food shopping and a couple of loads of washing and then on Friday evening/Saturday morning I do the other couple of loads of washing.
September 6, 2007 at 5:55 PM
Monday to Thursday-rise at 4:30 shower, cook porridge, eat porridge, walk to work. Work for 4-5 hours depending on roster, walk home drink coffee, go back to bed for a 2 hour nap. Prepare vegies for dinner, turn on computer and tv, read a book. Fridays- washing, ironing, vacuuming, dusting. Saturdays- shopping, baking. Sundays- my daughter comes to visit and we watch tv all day while she connects to the internet at my house because their landline is disconnected. Plenty of free time here since there is only 2 of us.
September 7, 2007 at 6:12 PM
We usually wash once a week like you do, but lately I have been washing a lot more due to the move, and now I'll be washing like mad for the next week.
I never hang anything on the line due to a really bad experience with a spider and a quilt cover, where we were being bitten for over 2 weeks and thought it must be mosquitoes or something. Then one morning I arrived just in time to see the spider finally crawling out of the quilt cover. It was a close relative of the white tail. We're very lucky it wasn't a white tail or this story might have a different ending.
I have yet to find a spider spray capable of guaranteeing peace of mind on this issue and never yet had a clothesline which didn't invite spidery friends to take up residence there. However we did purchase the most energy efficient dryer we could find (and are about to get an even more energy efficient condenser dryer) and we pay extra to be on the green electricity. I hope the new dryer arrives today, with my new dishwasher! ;)
As for ironing, I hated it with a passion until I got my Laura Star and now I quite like it, as long as I can watch tv while I do it. ;) I try to do a little ironing each day rather than all at once.
Snoskred
www.snoskred.org
September 12, 2007 at 11:38 AM