First, I can’t believe you’d read a blog titled “Laundry”.

But since you’re here…

I remember being a non-parent, listening to other parents complain about “always doing laundry”. I love laundry. I realize it’s work and takes time BUT it’s cathartic. Low brain power required, low active time required, and when it’s done, it’s DONE. Everything goes back into its place  right where it goes. No fuss.

I’m a little OCD. I LIKE when things have places and go back into them neatly, which goes against EVERY OTHER PART of parenting, period. So ” doing laundry all the time” would be a dream, right?

I also admit that I was spoiled. Both my children had a nanny (the same nanny, in fact) and she was GREAT at doing the kids’ laundry, neatly, consistently and perfectly, among many other great things. When Zoe started school at 2 years old, no nanny. I picked up that laundry duty, and it was no problem. One little extra load of tiny clothes a week.

As I sit here folding my second fat load of laundry this week, with twice as many tiny things that I just can’t believe my children wore in the past 3 days alone – even though I am the one who picks OUT those clothes – I get it.

I feel like I’m always doing laundry.

Sure, it still goes back into its place, but it doesn’t stay there neatly. Either my husband or my children will go into that place and dig like a small dog seeking a buried bone. So now I get to reorder those places each time I do laundry in addition to doing laundry. That’s fun. And it doesn’t stay there for long…

Plus, unlike with one child, where about every 6 months I’d rotate out the clothes that were getting worn or outgrown and rotate IN new clothes or hand-me-downs from the many size-labeled bins of  clothes in the kids’ closets, I now have to do the following:

• Rotate out the worn clothes for both kids
• Rotate into the bins in Ella’s room the outgrown clothes from Zoe (4 years is a big difference in size)
• Rotate in new and hand-me-down clothes from the bins in Zoe’s room
• Rotate in new and hand-me-down clothes from the bins in Ella’s room
• Rotate out the outgrown clothes from Ella

Oh, and in between, I have to wash it all, repeatedly.

Wash.Rinse.Repeat.