Creating a laundry routine or schedule is an excellent way to prevent clothing from cluttering your home. Clothes can quickly pile up without a regular routine to wash, dry, fold, hang and be put away. In my experience, my organizing clients with cluttered bedrooms and closets have some laundry related factors in common:
Excess clothing taking up storage space. There are various sizes and seasons of clothing. Although my client only wears a fraction of the clothes, he or she shops frequently and has not purged the clothing collection in a very long time.
Hampers or laundry baskets that are inefficient to the person’s needs. The size, style, design or amount of laundry containers do not fit the my client’s lifestyle.
No set location for “dry clean only” clothing, or a routine to bring these items into and out of the home. Setting up a place to hang clothing on its way to or from the dry cleaners and a drop-off and pick-up schedule helps to maintain a routine.
“Clerty” clothing in need of storage. Clothing that is not clean, but not dirty, doesn’t have a storage space. Perhaps my client wore it for a short time, but is not ready to wash it yet, so it piles up on the floor.
Clothing storage that is ineffective. The closets, dressers, shelving systems, hangers or other clothing storage currently in use is not the right type or size for my client.
Lack of a visual cue that it is time to wash the clothes. Without proper dirty clothing storage, such as an almost-full hamper, my client doesn’t have an idea of when there’s enough clothing to begin a load of wash.
Absence of a routine laundry schedule. Creating a set schedule to do the laundry, whether is is daily, weekly, or every other week helps to create a cycle of keeping clothing moving from the laundry basket to the drawer.
Time is not set aside to fold, hang and put away clean clothing. Another task that should be a routine is returning clothes to their proper home in dressers and closets.
Inefficient space or products to manage tasks such as folding, hanging items to dry or ironing. Creating a set place such as a drying rack to hang items that do not go in the dryer, and a location to iron clothing can help to make laundry related tasks much easier.
To prevent laundry piles from taking over bedrooms, try to tackle some of these common obstacles and create a laundry routine or schedule. After doing so, you should find it much easier to manage your clothing and keep your bedroom better organized.
I have a rack where I hang my bathrobe and clothes that are clean enough to wear again but not clean enough to put away. I can’t imagine what I did before (probably used the floor, as you say). We do laundry at the same time and on the same day every week. Sometimes it’s one load, sometimes it’s two. If it’s more than two, the least urgent items get left for the following week – we always catch up in a week or two. Maybe it’s boring to have a regular routine, but at least we never run out of clean clothes and towels!
You’re right Janet. Having a regular laundry routine may be boring, but it helps to keep everything clean and off the floor! Thanks for commenting.
As in all organizing, a routine is one of the most important aspects. There are lots of ways to put a routine into effect so choose one that works for you. Remember you can also partner with your family and delegate to the fluff and fold too!
Great advice, Ellen!
I prefer to do all my laundry in one day so I two sets of baskets for each person. One for dirty and one for clean. We setup a folding table and lay the basked above and below it to make it easy to fold and put in the respective baskets. Then everyone grabs their own clean basket and put their clothes away. It works nicely and I get all the laundry done in a day. :) Thanks for sharing your tips.
Thanks for the comment, Sabrina. It is great that you have a routine that works well for your family. Using 2 baskets for each person is a wonderful idea!
Oh my goodness, I laughed out loud when I read about “clerty” clothing Nancy! That is actually something my husband and I bicker about since he changes clothes several times a day and is often hanging his “clerties” everywhere!
I never used to have a laundry routine, but now I find it to be a necessity, with regular laundry and the towel/swim suit laundry my competitive swimmers generate each week
Thanks for the comment, Natalie. I usually get a laugh when I mention “clerty,” but it seems most people have that type of clothing. Setting aside a basket, bin or hooks to hold the “clerties” really does make a difference in keeping clothing organized.
Great post Nancy, and one that a lot of people need. A set routine on how you process laundry is so important. I have a bench in my bedroom I put clothes that can go another day before I have to wash them, usually stuff I wear around the house. I am trying to teach my 23 year old step daughter how beneficial having a laundry plan is.
A bench to hold clothes that can go another day before washing is a great idea!
Great tips – it always saves time to have a plan! Thank you for sharing with us at the #HomeMattersParty
Thank you!