There are three things I’ve been doing every single morning, seven days a week, without fail for over a year: make myself a Spark, pour Hadley the sippy cup of milk that she’s inevitably demanding, and start a load of laundry.
Laundry Tip: Do One Load Per Day
A couple of years ago I read an article written by a mom (I wish I could find it!) who loathed laundry day, which was the one day a week (usually a Saturday or Sunday) where she set aside several hours to do 4-5 loads of laundry that had piled up throughout the week. She set out to semi eliminate this cumbersome chore and decided to do one complete load every single day so that she didn’t have one specific day each week that was bogged down by laundry. Her article detailed what a positive impact this simple switch made on her routines and her attitude, and because I also rank laundry as one of my least favorite household chores, I decided to give her “one load a day” practice a whirl.
To say this practice stuck is a vast understatement; I swear by it. Keeping up a clean house isn’t easy with a teeny baby and an energetic toddler, so keeping the laundry load under control is a huge help.
Here’s how this routine looks for me.
- At some point first thing in the morning I gather all of the laundry from our master bedroom, Hadley’s room, Sadie’s room, and the basket in the laundry room itself (where miscellaneous dirty laundry goes such as dish towels).
- I only separate our clothing two ways: colors and whites.
- I throw all of the colors into the wash and start the load. Whites get washed and bleached on Wednesdays.
- A load usually runs for about 50 minutes, so as soon as it’s done I throw it in the dryer before we head out for preschool, a morning playdate, the grocery store, etc.
- At some point that afternoon I’ll grab it out of the dryer and toss it on our master bed.
- I separate it into piles depending on whose room it’s going to and then bring piles to said bedroom.
- At some point throughout the rest of the night each pile gets put away. Sadie’s usually gets put away after a diaper change; I lay her in her crib and take five minutes to put hers away. Hadley’s often gets done at night while Jamie is laying in bed with her reading a story. Towels usually get folded and put away as soon as they’re in a pile. Jamie’s and my laundry usually gets folded and put away together at the end of the day.
- Because these are daily piles, each pile only takes 2-5 minutes to put away entirely.
Another bonus reason to doing a load every day: potential stains on my kiddos’ clothes never sit too long and usually come right out!
As far as laundry-washing products go, we are totally sold out to Tide and have been for as long as I can remember. I started using Tide because I quickly realized early on in our marriage that Jamie’s Army uniforms and workout clothes needed to be washed with a product that cleaned them thoroughly and left them smelling fresh every. single. time. We tried out Tide and have been loyal ever since!
Now that we have a baby around whose clothing is washed with Army uniforms, I want a detergent that is a bit more gentle and pure but that’s still tough enough to tackle Hadley’s food and dirt stains and Jamie’s and my workout clothes.
Thankfully our favorite detergent brand came out with Tide purclean, the first bio-based detergent with the cleaning power of Tide (65% bio-based). It’s certified by the USDA BioPreferred Program, made with 100% renewable electricity, made a zero manufacturing waste to landfill site, and brand spankin’ new to the market!
Also, I don’t mind the honey lavender scent of this detergent one bit. I actually just opened up my washing machine a few minutes ago to transfer our clothes to the dryer, and the smell was refreshing!
Let’s chat!
1.) Are you particular about your laundry detergent? What qualities do you look for when selecting a brand?
2.) Would my routine of “a load a day” work for you?
Hi! I’m Erica, and I absolutely adore sharing my life on this website with you! I come here almost daily to blab about all of the things related to being a regular wife and mother in today’s ever-evolving society. I share about our new home, what’s on our kitchen table, what we’re hanging in our closets, where we’re traveling to next, my crazy 5 a.m. work outs, how I make time for girlfriends, our faith, and much more. We always have a lot of balls in the air and somewhat thrive on the chaos. I believe in the power of story-telling as a form of inspiration and entertainment, so I’m here to do both! I was born and raised in north Alabama and recently re-planted roots here again after my husband transitioned out of the Army (he is now in the Reserve and it’s going so well!) I’m a super proud mom to three little girls (ages 7, 4, and 1) who seem to be the stars of the show around here (for good reason – they’re pretty great!) I’m so glad you found me and are here reading! I hope we can get to know each other here on the blog as well as Facebook and/or Instagram. xoxo