Laundry Shortcomings

or: Confessions of a Clothes-washing Failure

My husband is admittedly anal retentive. Let's look, for instance, at his laundry habits back when he was a bachelor, before I took over laundry responsibilities.

He would put the clothes into the washer, properly sorted. When the washer stopped, he would pull out the clothes, shake them out, fold them neatly, and then put them into the dryer. He would then wait for the dryer to stop and immediately remove the clothing and hang it all up so as to stop any wrinkles from forming. All of the jeans are hung together, all of the long sleeve shirts are hung together, and t-shirts are neatly rolled and placed into drawers.

Now let's take a quick look at my laundry washing habits:

I do usually sort the laundry, but I don't think it's that big of a deal for something dark to end up with something light or whatever. I just don't wash anything red with my whites. I pile as much laundry as I can into the washer and let it run. Sometimes the same day, sometimes the next, I get the stuff out of the washer. (If it goes more than a day - which happens rather often - I'll run them through again so they aren't smelly.) So when I get back to it, I yank all the clothes from the washer, pile them into the dryer in no sort of orderly fashion, and run the dryer. Eventually I get back to the dryer (hopefully within a day or two) and pile all of the clean, dry clothes into a laundry basket, where it sits for another day or two in the living room or the bedroom. Then, I fold and hang everything and cram it all into drawers or closets.

Occasionally I get really motivated and get three loads of laundry washed, dried, and put away all in the course of one day. This is not common and should be considered a rather exciting event.

But seriously. Wait for the dryer to stop running so i can hang up all the clothes immediately. I'm sorry, I can think of a lot of things I'd rather do besides waiting for the dryer to stop.

Why is this an issue at all? Because my husband actually wants to do his own laundry because I apparently make such a mess of it. And that makes me feel like quite the failed housewife.

I think maybe I should take up ironing as a hobby, since me getting the laundry done in such an anal retentive fashion simply will not EVER happen.

But the thought of ironing jeans... let alone all of his shirts... makes me cringe. I hate ironing. I actually don't even own an ironing board. When a sewing pattern says "press", I assume they're talking to someone else, surely not me. Now, if he was going to some desk job and wearing dress shirts and slacks, I might be able to at least see how a lack of wrinkles is important. But he works in the OIL FIELD. He wears coveralls over his clothes all day long. But heaven forbid his jeans have a wrinkle, or aren't creased just so. Oy! Seriously?

I see nothing wrong with taking a very hot shower without the fan on, getting the bathroom all nice and steamy, and hanging my clothes from the towel rack, then putting them on immediately. That's my version of ironing, and I like it that way.