I live in an apartment building with a common laundry room in the basement. There's a drying cabinet and a tumble dryer there, but I actually prefer to use a clothes drying rack in my apartment. I only use the drying cabinet for larger items (sheets, towels) and almost never the tumble dryer.
Overall Rating: votes
-
Posted 1 year ago #
-
@Periwinkle As Trish said, in many places in the US it's a violation of local ordinances/HOAs to have clotheslines on one's property; people are working to get those ordinances removed, especially in light of the current economic situation, but it can be a long hard slog. There can also be a social stigma attached to line-drying; my parents and grandparents were poor and they were horrified at my choice to dry my clothes outside in the warmer months.
I'm lucky enough to live somewhere which encourages energy-saving measures such as clotheslines, and have two retractable lines that run the length of my patio, plus a large wooden drying rack from Ikea (which has been discontinued! Why?).
Posted 1 year ago # -
That's weird about a stigma attached to an outdoor clothes line! We're a family of 4 and have never had a drier, they cost a lot to run and take up space we don't have, just wasteful. Plus the smell of line-dried washing is just gorgeous: clean and fresh with no stinky washing perfumes, mmm! When the weather is bad, we have a lovely drying rack on a pulley system which goes above the stairs, it's at the top of the house so the heat rising up there dries things quite quickly. I have some of those plastic peg things for socks and pants which hangs on it too, even more drying space :) When I used reusable nappies and had lots of baby washing to do, we had a fold-out rack too, but I only use that after holidays now. I still do one load a day though, often 2. I've never actually seen the bottom of my laundry basket!
Posted 1 year ago # -
THankfully where I live you can still have outdoor lines. I use mine as often as possible. I also have 2 lines that run the length of my husband's workshop in the basement, and a drying rack for small things. I do have a dryer and use it occasionally. Often I'll dry the small things (socks, underwear, hankerchiefs) that will dry in 5-10 minutes and do all the large pieces on the line. I love the smell of line dryed sheets and towels, plus the towels absorb better than dried with softener. The only things that get really "stiff" are jeans, and my husband doesn't seem to mind. :)
Posted 1 year ago # -
@pklimain: You are quite right about towels. Even with a tumble dryer, I use very minimal no-scent detergent and NO fabric softener, ever. It degrades the quality of fabrics of all kinds, plus it's poisonous to pets.
Posted 1 year ago # -
i've never used fabric softener in my life.
it seems like clutter to me.
and it coats fabrics with that awful smell and "feel", blech!Posted 1 year ago # -
I absolutely identify with this thread! Most of my living space isn't the least bit cluttered now, and is somewhere between uncluttered and minimalist (nothing on the walls, a few carefully chosen decorative items, not much in the way of "extras"), but I have trouble keeping up with the floors, dusting, and deep cleaning in general. I really hate that my house isn't messy (in the sense of junk everywhere) but is often dirty anyway. The only things I really keep clean all the time are my kitchen counters (I wipe them clean after every single use, or at least once a day) and my toilet (I use the Flylady "swish and swipe) trick near-daily). So I suppose it's time to get in the habit of more regular deeper cleaning, but I can't seem to motivate myself. Looks like I am not alone!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Urgh, my downfall is putting away the dishes. I never just wash, dry and put them away. As I type, the clean dishes from breakfast, and dinner preparation are stacked willy-nilly on the draining board. It would be so much easier for meal making to start with a clean sink and draining board, but I just can't get my act together. It drives my husband crazy.
Posted 1 year ago # -
bandicoot, I completely agree! Fabric softener is revolting stuff, seems to me its main function is to mask the smell of badly-washed clothes. I'm allergic to most brands of washing powder and a lot of perfumes, just smelling other people's fabric-conditioner-soaked clothes makes my nose itch. But then, I'd class pretty much all perfumed products as clutter, even if only clutter for the nose, plus why overload our senses with artificial fragrances of unknown toxicity? If my kids stay at my MIL's she sometimes washes their clothes, and I have to wash them again about 3 times to get the stench of fabric conditioner out of them, yuck!
Lazycow, do you have a dishwasher? I just got mine fixed, and it makes the most enormous difference to my kitchen. I too suffer from an inability to put away the washing up, I let stuff dry on a tea towel but then it stays there... I've been much better lately though, the dishwasher helps, as does doing it last thing at night, or just after meal prep. One thing I've been doing is washing up the pans etc before bed, then doing those final few chores (wipe the surfaces, put away stuff, brush teeth, put on the dishwasher, usual late night things), and by the time I'm done the pans are dry and ready to put away :) If I'm really knackered I'll leave it till the next morning to put it away though, sometimes you need to cut some slack. The kitchen looks so much better and is so much easier to use without pans everywhere. Even my dh managed to make dinner last night and keep the mess to only a small area :)I've decided a zero tolerance attitude towards kitchen surfaces is the way forward for me!Posted 1 year ago # -
Well, there are unscented fabric softeners. :) I am using them less and less. As it is very cold and very dry (low humidity) in Alaska in the winter, our clothing tends to get static-y which is why I orginally started using the softener. But now that I'm not working - and so not on carpeting all day long or wearing synthetic fabrics so much (but I'm never giving up my fleece!) - it doesn't seem to be as much problem. I'm on the verge of stopping.... LOL
Posted 1 year ago # -
@lottielot, I'm ashamed to admit that my dishwasher is broken and I haven't used it in months. I've almost forgotten that it's there! I was shocking at loading and emptying it anyway. I think I'll see if I can get it fixed this week.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I gave up on my dishwasher! We rent, and it's a cheap model- it just doesn't get the job done. I decided if I already had to scrub the dishes before they went in, and then sometimes rinse spots off and dry again after they were done, might as well just wash them totally by hand. I use my dishwasher as a drying rack now. :)
Posted 1 year ago # -
pkilmain, sorry, I wasn't casting aspersions at people who use fabric conditioners, just pointing out the often unstated associations that many people seem to have with 'cleanliness' and artifical scents. My mum used to use gallons of biological washing liquid on our clothes when we were kids, and I had excema. It wasn't till I left home and did my own washing that the excema went and I made the connection. If I use certain (highly perfumed) brands of washing up liquid my hands come out in blisters and are very painful, hence my associations with cheap artificial scents are very unpleasant. Also, as a society I don't think we should be washing and flushing vast amounts of perfume into our waterways. Or be victims of the marketing of such perfumes, many of which are made by multinationals with a vested interest in us wanting to buy products which they've drummed into people as being in some way 'cleaner' or 'fresher' compared with perfectly good and often cheaper or free alternatives. I'm happy for other people to use fabric conditioner or any other product they like, I just think they should consider whether they need or want it rather than buy stuff on autopilot (as many people I know do, including my dh, whose deodorant makes me sneeze!). Which is what unclutterer is all about, no?
My dishwasher is now my new best friend, I'd forgotten how much I love it :) The man who fixed it said it was a 'superb machine' and my glasses are coming out all sparkly now, we live in a very hard water area so everything gets coated in scale from the water when hand-washing. A cheap dishwasher is a pain though, I used to have a brand which looked good and was rubbish, and I had to put everything under the tap first, then it broke and no-one would come and fix it because it was such a rubbish brand! Using it as a drying rack is an inspired idea :)Posted 1 year ago # -
Lottielot - didn't take it that way! :) Everything I buy I try to get unscented as my husband is very sensitive to perfumed things, so I know how you feel (well, sort of).
Posted 1 year ago #
Reply
You must log in to post. If you do not already have an account, you can register here.
