Large Family Laundry Management

Probably the chore I hear moms dreading most is laundry.  In our house, it is nothing to dread and nothing that takes over the house (although I love to joke, when someone accuses me of being Super Mom, that I have no cape and that even if I did it would be buried under a mountain of laundry!).

But in reality, a laundry system is one thing that our family manages efficiently, and I want to share our system and some suggestions with you today.

My favorite tip to share with moms is to train their kids early on to do the laundry! My kids started around 4 years of age, when they were old enough to sort.  They could sort dirty laundry into lights and darks, and they could sort clean laundry by person (the kids usually knew better than I did whose shirt or jeans was whose!) After learning how to sort, by the time they were around 6, they would learn how to load the washer and switch from the washer to the dryer (having a front-loading set is key here!), as well as helping to fold and put away clothes.  And last, by age 8-9 they could do an entire load of laundry themselves from start to finish.

The second tip that is essential to avoiding mountains of laundry, is teaching kids what is truly dirty. Underwear always goes in the dirty laundry!! Pants and skirts that are not soiled can be worn multiple times.  If we’ve been outside, shirts are usually sweaty and dirty after the first day; if not, they may be able to be worn again before being washed.  Anything with food stains on it is dirty!

The last key to not feeling overrun with laundry, is having a laundry calendar.  Our laundry days match our bedroom set-up, and each bedroom has its own laundry day.  We schedule our laundry days around our other activities so that we do not have laundry to do on church days, days with lots of errands, or on Saturday when we want to have fun!  Pick days that work with your schedule.

Mondays – Dad and Mom, towels

Tuesdays – Older girls

Thursdays – Boys

Fridays – Younger girls

Once a month, the bedding gets washed on the laundry day.  During seasons where we had a baby in our bedroom, the baby’s laundry got washed with ours.  Otherwise, everyone in the family knows that if it is your bedroom, it is your laundry and responsibility.  We have teens in the boys’ room and the older girls’ room; one of the older girls also helps oversee the younger girls’ laundry.  When I had only younger kids, it was definitely more for me to personally manage, but I still only did laundry three days a week (by the time we moved to four days I had children old enough to manage).

That is it!  It might seem oversimplified, but for our family it works very well, and no one does laundry more than once a week, with a possible second day to help a sibling, so no one feels overwhelmed! I would love to hear what works in your family!

What suggestions do you have for laundry management?