The part I despise the most is putting them in the closet. I’ve tried many solutions, but I’ve not found any that made the job less tedious.
When I was a student, I just threw my clothes into various shelves based on the type and considered that good enough. I did not fold clothes ever. I just threw the boxers in one shelf, the socks in another, T-shirts in another, pants in another.
As an adult with a family, this won’t be accepted anymore.
I had a period in which I had a dryer, but I did not find that it saved me a lot of time because the fastest way to get the laundry into the shelves and the hangers is by sorting it first. And if I had to sort it anyways, I could just sort it on the drying rack and put it on the hangers on the drying rack.
I think it’s fairly hard to find solutions to fix this.
I have considered mapping out each step, and then try to identify the pain points. Then find ways to remove as much friction as possible. Kind of like how an UX designer would handle this.
Become a nudist.
I’m a nudist and this is actually legit. I only wear clothes to go outside sometimes and often only briefly so I’ll usually just hang them back up when I’m done. I only do a single small load of laundry once a month or so. My wife isn’t so she has to do like 4 loads a month of her clothes.
Maybe consider not washing things so often? Underwear, socks and t shirt I wear one day, but an outer shirt I might wear twice, pants or shorts for a week, towels last one to two weeks.
Single type of socks so you don’t need to pair them.
Dry shirts/t-shirts etc on hangers, then just hang up the hangers. You can extend this to trousers etc if you have the hanging space.
Single type of socks so you don’t need to pair them.
I didn’t even realize what a life hack this actually is despite having been doing it for like 15 years.
People keep gifting me fancy sports socks… They just go in the misc socks draw and don’t get used 😭
I find listening to audio books or watching a favourite show or chatting with a friend on the phone helps my brain while folding so I’m unaware i did it.
I find my struggle is tasks like this gets so monotonous. Repeat boredom is the part that bugs my brain. it’s all like “cant we just do something else?” So i make sure to have prepped a secondary activity for my brain to be distracted by while the body goes through the motions.
Clothes don’t have to go in the closet. If they’re your clothes and they don’t get in anyone’s way, your family doesn’t have a right to complain about you storing them on a pile on your bedroom floor, if putting clothes away is making you so miserable.
Alternatively, maybe strike up a deal with another household member for them to do your laundry in exchange for you doing some other household chore for them (e.g. you’ll take out the bins when it’s their turn to do the bins, you’ll cook all their meals, etc).
I genuinely love laundry so I’m not sure I’m the best person to comment but here are a few suggestions:
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as others have said, get a set of drawers so that you can just chuck different clothing items in different drawers. If there’s no space for that you could get some storage containers/baskets for smaller items in your closet.
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Try rolling up your clothes rather than folding them. This is often recommended for packing but I always do it. It saves space and you can roll a bunch of clothes quickly and they’re easy to move from where you’re folding to the wardrobe. This image gives a rough idea, but you can find tonnes of videos as well:
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I have a dryer. All clothes go in the dryer because outside is wet and inside is tiny. If clothes don’t like the dryer, they shrink and we can’t wear them, therefore all clothes are dryer-safe. After dryer, clothes are piled on couch. When clean clothes are needed, they’re on the couch.
Become a nudist.
No clothes = no laundry.
I used to dislike laundry in the past, until I figured out that the part that I disliked was the monotony and lack of mental stimulation. This could be solved by listening to podcasts or audiobooks while doing the laundry. Now I no longer dislike it, because it’s really only an opportunity to listen to podcasts for 30-40 minutes (hang-drying/folding time)
why won’t it be accepted any more? Does your family care more about the state of your closet than you being happy?
Seriously, talk to them about it, tell them how you feel.Live out of a laundry basket. If anyone questions it just curl yourself around the laundry basic and scream like a possum protecting its nest of young. Maintain solid eye contact throughout. Defecate if necessary.
They’ll never mention it again and probably warn others. you can then live out of that laundry basket free of judgement.
Follow me for more info about living life with the freedom of a possum .
Find a partner who doesn’t mind doing laundry.
Nakedness. Ideally find a work from home situation. Careful answering the door.
Converting my family into nudists does not seem to be the right solution here.
However, the idea of trying to reduce the amount of clothes that are worn daily might be on the right track.
Start with pants. You can wear one pair of bluejeans for a week.
A week? Rookie numbers
You’re supposed to wear raw jeans for at least half a year before ever washing them.
…. Only a week?
My partner’s dad had a pair that stood on their own. Not frozen, just gross. Gotta admire the dedication I guess.
My grandpa wore coveralls, he had a rack of identical coveralls and I can’t remember him ever wearing anything else.
Lower your standards. Half-ass fold things. Don’t use hangers. I drape over the drying rack and have gotten pretty adept at a quick lift and couple of shitty folds into a stack. Another tip is to have clothing that don’t care about wrinkles (synthetics, sports clothing). Then you can just throw them into a drawer. I have pretty homogeneous clothing (all the same featureless t-shirt in black, white, grey, same underwear, etc). This helps with the organizing on to the drying rack. I know exactly how many of each goes where and it is trivial to color coordinate so the half ass folding naturally collates the stacks.
I wait to do laundry every couple of weeks. It all fits in one load most of the time (bought largest high efficiency machine, 12kg capacity). Some clothing gets more than one use before washing, and it entirely depends on how active I am in that clothing.
All of this helps me personally mitigate my extreme disdain at the task. Oh, and getting absolutely stoned out of my mind. Put on some tunes, it ain’t so bad either the draping (largest things first), or the shitty folding.
As an adult with a family, this won’t be accepted anymore.
Says who? Like if it’s your clothes your room your life, do it your way.
Signed. A couple who hasn’t folded clothes in months
