I’ve always HATED doing laundry. I hated it so much my husband and I have tried out multiple different laundry services over the past years. One of those included a wash-and-fold pick-up and drop-off service and another involved dropping off your laundry in a locker. All the services cost us about $80 a month!
A big part of why I hated doing laundry was because we lived in an apartment building where you had to lug your dirty clothes down the hall and sometimes have to wait for machines to free up before you could start your loads. I thought once we bought our house that maybe I would start to not hate it so much–of course I was wrong. That’s when I realized it wasn’t about the inconvenience of living in an apartment but just that I really hate doing laundry and that I needed to make more changes, aside from having our own washer and dryer, to make it more bearable.
Here’s how I eventually got over this hatred.
Make it a habit.
I know you probably hear this a lot, but turning something you hate into something that’s just automatic and part of your routine really helps. This way, you don’t even think about it nor have the time to dread it. My husband, who always wakes up earlier than me, takes the dirty laundry downstairs first thing Saturday morning. Sometimes he’ll even load the washer if he’s feeling nice, then I take care of the rest, and everything is done by Saturday afternoon. We’ve found that this is the best time for us to do it simply because Saturday is usually when we just stay in and chill at home.
Laundry is so much harder to tackle when there’s a lot of it, so by doing it weekly (probably more if you have a family), it makes the chore a lot more manageable. I used to think it made more sense to let it pile up so I only have to do the chore once as opposed to smaller loads more frequently, but I found that it was just too tiring that way. The amount of clothes that needed to be folded at once was overwhelming.
Make it fun.
One of the main changes I made so I would stop hating laundry is that I made a point to bring the clean laundry up to our master bedroom every time and watch something fun on YouTube or Netflix while I folded and put away clothes. This is actually nice “me time” away from the hubby where I can watch YouTube videos on house tours and morning routines or watch Friends reruns.
Make it efficient.
For productivity geeks like me, introducing a new tool to help make things more efficient is always a motivator. When I first got into my whole laundry slump, I bought this thing called the MiracleFold Laundry Folder. It helps you fold clothes quickly and neatly.
I don’t use the MiracleFold anymore because I’ve gotten really good at folding shirts really quickly, and it’s kind of a hassle to take the thing out of the closet, but at the time, it did make folding less painful and kind of fun! This is just one example of how you can find a new tool that might get you motivated. New notebooks, for instance, are always great motivators for when you’re starting a new class, just how a new running app might help get you outside running more.
No Comments