How many loads of washing a week?

blueberrypie

LandyAndy wrote: »

I've read this thread with some amazement.

What do you people find to wash?

We are 4 (Me, MrsLA and two teenage DS's) and I do five loads of clothes on Sunday (one white, two coloured, two dark) plus one load for either bedding or towels.

Ok I load the machine up a bit but how do some people do a dozen loads a week or wash every day?

Are you washing each item separately?:rotfl:

I think there are lots of factors which can affect how much laundry you produce. A friend of mine does one load a day just for her husband - but his job involves him getting very mucky, and so his work-clothes have to go in every day (and are rough fabric, so can't really be washed with most other laundry). Another friend has a child whose bedding needs washed every day (because he's wet it). Another friend has three boys who all play rugby at least three times a week...

My laundry is reduced by things like only having boys (who, in my experience, aren't quite as quick to change their clothes as girls LOL), and by having no school uniforms or dressy work-clothes to wash. And I don't routinely wash big towels - the hand-towels in the bathroom get washed, but I don't wash bigger towels every time they're used - if you've only just had a shower the towel isn't going to be dirty! - and I don't leave big towels in the bathrooms, so they can't be used after washing hands/faces.

blueberrypie

SunnyGirl wrote: »

I have myself, DH, 4 children aged 16, 16, 14 & 10 and a dog and I wash 2 sometimes 3 loads a day. I bought a new washing machine last year which holds a 9kg load. I don't use a dryer I peg out or use 2 clothes airers which are permamently up on the landing. It's interesting to see how other people do it all too.

You're doing 14+ loads a week at 9kg a load? Wow. We've two more people than you, and I do less than half of that, despite having a baby in cloth nappies and two other children who are still at food-all-down-your-front-at-every-meal age.

I dry very little - socks and undies if the weather is wet and I'm running out of indoor hanging space, but not much else.

SunnyGirl

blueberrypie wrote: »

You're doing 14+ loads a week at 9kg a load? Wow. We've two more people than you, and I do less than half of that, despite having a baby in cloth nappies and two other children who are still at food-all-down-your-front-at-every-meal age.

I dry very little - socks and undies if the weather is wet and I'm running out of indoor hanging space, but not much else.

I don't fill the drum for every load as if I do I don't have the space to dry it. I do one light and one dark load a day & the bedding is done over 4 loads - one for 3 singles, one for a king size & one for a double with towels in as well if it'll fit. The 3 boys between them do basketball, boxing, karate, running & football every week which makes for a lot of smelly clothes needing washing. My DD does army cadets, badminton & running plus she is doing a childcare course with every other week at a child care setting, currently it's 2-4yr olds, so her 'work' stuff often gets paint, sick, food etc down it. We all wear clothes for more than one day, if it's not dirty it doesn't get washed. The washing has increased since they were all small even though then, as you say, they throw food everywhere & anywhere Also the sheer size of the clothes now - DH, DS2 in large & DS1 in extra large makes a difference.

sparklewing

There's 2 of us here and I do 2 washes a week.

I don't bother separating clothes unless there is something new in the wash so all darks and whites get thrown in together (to be fair though we have 3 white tops between us and everything else is black pretty much). The other wash is towels and bedding (spare bed one week as the cats sleep on it and our bed the other). Admittedly I do cram as much as humanly possible into the machine I can fit (with a bit of elbow grease) a kingsized duvet, pillow cases, sheet, 2 bath towels and a hand towel into one load.

OrkneyStar

With 2 adults and DS (nearly two) we do probably about 5-6 loads a week. This was more (about 6-8 a week) when we used real nappies. We have a new A rated WM which does 6kg, as old one died, so we can get decent sized loads without compromising wash quality. If enough clothing I separate lights/darks (if not they go in together), woolens, towels, bedding. Nappies used to be washed pretty much only with other nappies or towels and no fabric softeners used. I tend to fill drum 3/4 full to full, although rarely if there is something really needing washing I might do a half load (but then press the mini load button). We don't have water meters here in Scotland and water rates are set with the Council Tax, we pay £164.24 per year for water and £185.60 per year for sewerage- £349.84 per year or £29.15 pcm, for a 3 bed house with 1 bathroom (although only have a shower in there!) and a downstairs loo. Even though there is not really a financial incentive to use less water we still try to .

Ben84

I have no automatic washing machine and everything has to be washed in the sink. One thing you discover when you hand wash is that many things we wash aren't really dirty, because you can see the water is still clear after washing them and nothing is coming out. I wash things as and when they need it. Bed covers every week, while clothes and towels I just do when needed.

Use your judgement, if it's clean, fresh and crisp still then it's fine. Depending on what you've been doing and the weather, something might last six days or six hours. Underwear needs to be washed daily, but for shirts, jumpers and jeans there's no timer on how long you can wear something, and it helps to remember that there is nothing dirty about wearing something that you can clearly see and feel is still clean. I do refresh things by steam ironing them if they're a little crumpled. Most things that people wash just need a quick ironing to restore them, because they're not really dirty.

mazza111

1 load per day unless i do the bedding, and atm, because i washed the net curtains yesterday and my 6 month old washing machine is now full of water. AAARGH Can't get an engineer out until Wednesday morning........

AAAAAAAARGH going to be a bloody load of the stuff to do by then

Justamum

I do one load of darks each day - DH needs to change every day as he is in a dirty job; DS is just a boy and needs to change every day! DD1 also has a dark school uniform and gets a bit whiffy! Light colours - probably twice a week. Bedding weekly, so that's about 2 - 3 loads. I change the dish cloth/tea towel/kitchen towel daily and do a boil wash about every 10 days when the bucket gets full. Bath towels about twice a week.

Caterina

Family of 4 adults (me, DH, DD 20 and DS 20), change sheets in my bed once a fortnight and wash together with towels or whites.

Change teatowels every day but bath towels once a week (DH and I let our towel dry on our bedroom door after shower and then reuse), hand towels every 2-3 days. Works out to 1 towel wash per week inc. DS and DD towels.

Clothes wash for me and DH probably one per week.

DS and DD do their clothes laundry every couple of weeks.

Altogether it works out appx 3-4 laundries per week, sometimes 5 if we all decide we do our wash.

When kids were young we had laundry almost every day of the week, sometimes twice a day but now I have set up a discipline of reuse, persuaded DH to change work shirt every 2 days instead of every day (now he wears a vest and gets out of work shirt immediately on his return, hangs shirt and changes into house clothes). I air my jumpers and trousers and the only daily change is underwear.

We don't seem to pong too much (at least nobody has complained hehe) and feel we have reached a reasonable washing balance.

kazwookie

Oh and me so 3 to 4 times per week, normally on a Saturday morning as that is when I have time

Has pigpen been in this thread yet??:rotfl: