Mangle - clothes dryer

MallyGirl

Caterina wrote: »

If I put a few bits and pieces, not jeans or very dirty or heavy things, just light stuff underwear and tshirts, nightie, etc. in the bowl, and stomp on it a bit, with some shower gel, I use the Eco stuff that has no nasties, then use another bowl for rinse (and save that water too for the toilet), I should be able to dramatically cut the washing machine laundry!

I just fear that DH will think I have gone completely bonkers!

Anyone else do this?

This just brought up images of 'I love Lucy' and the grape stomping sketch.

This wouldn't be a step too far for my OH - it would be a giant leap!

Caterina

It's crazy how our husbands, who probably value our moneysaving ways and thrift, sometimes are our biggest obstacles to frugality!

I have mine fairly well trained, but still cannot persuade him, for example, to scavenge in skips (unless I am there and point out treasures to him). He is just back from BANDQ his favourite haunt, buying planks of wood to make veg boxes in the allotment! We have mountains of pallets at the allotment but he would rather go and buy the timber. Go figure!

Nomoonatall

Caterina wrote: »

It's crazy how our husbands, who probably value our moneysaving ways and thrift, sometimes are our biggest obstacles to frugality!

I have mine fairly well trained, but still cannot persuade him, for example, to scavenge in skips (unless I am there and point out treasures to him). He is just back from BANDQ his favourite haunt, buying planks of wood to make veg boxes in the allotment! We have mountains of pallets at the allotment but he would rather go and buy the timber. Go figure!

I had to stop my ex from scavenging in skips! It was horrifying! I also banned him from that DIY place. We always ended up with planks of wood hogging the car space, with me crouched in the back. If he eventually made something out of the planks I wouldn't have been bothered...but my spare room had more ruddy wood than a saw mill!

Caterina

Nomoonatall wrote: »

I had to stop my ex from scavenging in skips! It was horrifying! I also banned him from that DIY place. We always ended up with planks of wood hogging the car space, with me crouched in the back. If he eventually made something out of the planks I wouldn't have been bothered...but my spare room had more ruddy wood than a saw mill!

LOL yes that's the other side of the equation! :rotfl:

However, to be fair to DH, he chose to go today because on Weds they give older people 10% off and he used the gift card that we loaded when he was still working and gave us 11% off (buy £100 for £89) so he got a decent discount. Might not be totally trained but some of it has been seeping through and he spends accordingly. Can't really complain.

Re. laundry, today I washed my smalls in the shower with me, so I have made a stealthy start on the cut-the-laundry project.

We have to do at least one full wash a fortnight with DH's 3 martial arts suits, what I will do is I will sneak in the odd top or shirt there, provided they do not leak colour (or I would hear about it for, like, ever! ).

Spendless

Caterina wrote: »

It's crazy how our husbands, who probably value our moneysaving ways and thrift, sometimes are our biggest obstacles to frugality!

I have mine fairly well trained, but still cannot persuade him, for example, to scavenge in skips (unless I am there and point out treasures to him). He is just back from BANDQ his favourite haunt, buying planks of wood to make veg boxes in the allotment! We have mountains of pallets at the allotment but he would rather go and buy the timber. Go figure!

That made me smile. My FIL when in better health used to make a lot of pine furniture. He always had a project on the go, but when you used to ask him if he had any small off-cuts (for any reason). He used to say he hadn't got any and he'd go and buy some more. We used to ask him, wait for his negative reply, then when he wandered out fo ear-shot ask my MIL to get us some of his scraps, she always did

My only experience of using a mangle, is one of the swimming baths when I was a child used to have one in the changing rooms. We used to put our costume through it after swimming and I always remember it coming out bone dry,

Laura_Elsewhere

I spent years living without a washing machine as a student and somehow never used laundrettes. I used to leave the water in after having a bath and then put my laundry in, get a paperback to read and walk up and down for a good couple of chapters

Yes, it was dirty water, but it was also loosening all the light dirt and it wasn't filthy-dirty, only not-clean. By the time I'd rinsed the laundry twice, it was as clean as it was going to be. I'd wring it out and drape it all over the stair railings on the landing (lucky we were the only occupied flat in that building...
Later, in Halls of Res, I just did bits of hand-washing most days in my bedroom's little wash-basin, and hung things to dry in the window on coat-hangers from the curtain rail.

Here, we have a wonderful modern 1400rpm-spin washing machine, and an excellent efficient tumble-dryer, but I still dry my handwash things hanging from the curtain-rail, socks draped over the pipes in the airing cupboard, and jumpers on a wooden "woollie horse"...

[Deleted User]

Thanks for all the replies. I live in a house that has electric outages often, which is why I was thinking about a mangle. I remember using a mangle in the 1970s as a young child in the back yard, so I have some experience of aching muscles, blisters etc.

I do wash outdoors when it's not winter. I do this with the other women using the village spring around which is a low wall to scrub clothes. It's the rugs that get beaten with a wooden bat to clean them.

In winter, washing has to be done at home in a wet room, but it's brutally cold and in a couple of weeks of washing my hands are bleeding, which I'd rather not happen this year! I don't have anyone at home to help me wring out the clothes and this is the bit that wrecks my hands, particularly with sheets. I do still want a mangle :-)