A Simpler Life 2018

Ploppy57 I think our OHs must be related. Mine has CDs although we don’t even have a CD player any more. The worst is the wires, cables, charges, plugs for long gone appliances. He has agreed to round them up and confine them to one box - only problem is we haven’t currenntly got a big enough box !

In the spirit of sharing how differently we do things, I sort my washing a lot! I find that washing according to instructions really helps prolong the life of clothes. It may be significant that I make a lot of my own clothes (though not OH's!) and am quite fussy about them.
We have a piece of furniture (made by OH) that has books and ornaments on top. Underneath, it has 4 frames that slide out, each with a washing bag hung on. Darks, whites, ordinary, delicates. Every day I look at them and see if I can make up a wash. I certainly mix a bit - a few robust darks or the odd 'delicate' might go in an ordinary wash and so on. I have a bucket for kitchen washing, and towels and bedding do go straight in the machine.
I do know this wouldn't suit everyone! I have enough room, and as we wear clothes until they fall apart, we have a good supply of 'everyday' clothes. I also have a fantastic airing cupboard, thanks to the solar thermal panels, so drying is easy. I'm retired, and although busy, can do things at the right time to maximise energy use.
However, even before I retired, I was careful to wash clothes properly. I still regularly wear everyday clothes that are 20 years old. Bought T shirts don't last that long - I reckon to get 4-5 years of good use and another 4-5 years of 'round the house' use.
Have a good Friday all

I would like to report a success today with laundry simplification.

I put slightly less clothes in the machine, whipped them out straight away, flapped them within an inch of their lives and hung them up, giving the odd crease a stretch out.

Preliminary inspection now they are almost dry suggests that they can go straight in the wardrobe!!

:dance:

I shall use the ironing time wisely and read instead.

Evening everyone

Just came home from my sister's, actually only wanted to pick something up but ended up watching a whole movie with her. Had to go home now as I need to do laundry and get some stuff done for my "side job" - well, actually it is less a job but more being paid for something I love doing and would do anyways, paid or not... - which I will need tomorrow, otherwise we would probably have ended up ordering pizza or making a dash to the supermarket to get something unhealthy...

There are hardly any clothes I iron, currently I have one pair of summer trousers and one blouse that needs ironing plus tea towels and hankies, but since I have enough of them I don't have to do it weekly. I was tired of taking the ironing board out each time so I now put a towel on my kitchen counter and iron on top of that, works just fine, I have a stone surface in the kitchen, so don't have to worry about burning it. Only take the board out now when I sew.

I live alone and wash once a week as I have a relatively small wardrobe so don't want to wash only every second week. I only sort into a 60° wash for towels, kitchen stuff, underwear, bedding and anything else that can stand the heat. "Regular" clothes, socks and tights get washed at 40°. I don't have any white garnments, only a bra or two, while towels and stuff are coloured. So there isn't much that can take colour. I am extra carefull though when I have a new dark garnment, especially jeans, sometimes I can justify running a dark and a light 40° wash and other times I will wash the few items I fear might take the colour by hand or wait for next week.

Lately I bought some washing liquid for delicate fabrics as I use it to wash knits. Stood in front of the washing powder / soften shelf in the supermarket and wondered why the hell there are more different softener than there are washing powder?????

@bluegreen, I wouldn't do the detour with the toddler bed either, for this year or two in which he will use it and then you will need a new bed, mattresss, sheets again... I slept in a single bed from about 2 1/2 and to prevent me from falling out my parents put two chairs next to the bed, so I would roll from the bed onto the chairs and then the backrest would stopp me from falling to the floor...

@wednesday good idea with the one sort of fruit rule. I think it is easiest to figure out how much you need to buy when you only have one kind of fruit as you can just count how many you will likely eat in a week or whatever you shopping intervall. I basically only eat apples in winter and never run out before going to the shops again and don't have to throw any away because I don't eat them quick enough, but in summer when I am likely to have melons, berries, peaches.... I often end up going to the shops to top up or trying to keep on top of my fruits before they go up.

So, need to go downstairs and hang my laundry up... Our laundry room has a dehumifier, so it will dry very quickly. Hardly used the dryer since I moved here, in winter everything goes into the laundry room and in summer I will only hang up the big suff downstairs and everything that fits onto my drying rack goes out onto the balcony. So glad the times of wet cardigans hanging from all my chairs and jeans that didn't got dry for 24 hours are over...