Around the House, It’s the Little Things That Count

This post is sponsored by P&G. Save on NEW Gain Flings and Tide Pods at Target. Text CLEAN to Target (827438) for mobile coupons*.

When it comes to trying to keep house while managing a busy work life and spending time with an energetic little girl, sometimes it’s the little things that count. Chores around the house can sometimes start to pile up, especially laundry. Between our every day clothes, Edith’s post-meal changes, cloth diapering, workout clothes, bedding and towels it can be easy to fall behind and hard to catch up. We’ve spent weekends doing load after load of laundry only to wake up Monday morning with no clean towels to take a shower with and having to wear mismatched socks and shirts that should have been thrown out ages ago. On top of that, it’s often that the laundry that does get done never gets folded.

As part of our attempts to become more efficient and organized around the house and in our every day life, we’ve decided to make a number of changes some little and some major. One of those changes is to how we approach the laundry in the house. Before this, separating our laundry wasn’t very likely. We’d take our dirty clothes at the end of the day and throw them all in the same hamper, a pile of darks, colors, whites, his and hers (Edith’s have always been kept separate). Laundry is a chore that we tend to split and one of us would do a load of laundry and by the time it was dry; sorting, folding and hanging all of that laundry was a daunting task (I can honestly never keep track of what goes where with Lindsay’s clothes).

Some of the little changes we’ve made to help make our laundry process easier are:

• Come up with a more efficient separating process – We’ve now got a much more strategic sorting process. In addition to the bins we had before for cloth diapers and Edith’s clothes, we’ve placed baskets in the bathroom for towels and bedding, one in the kitchen for dish cloths, and separate baskets in the bedroom for my clothes, Lindsay’s clothes, a shared one for workout clothes and a shared one for whites.
• Do at least one load a day, but no more than two – Doing this has allowed us to not get overwhelmed by large piles of laundry that need to be done. We can keep the load sizes manageable and keep on top of the dirty laundry. The reason we don’t limit to two is because the washer and dryer are up against the wall with Edith’s crib on the other side. While she doesn’t mind the dryer, our washer can be quite loud when it’s running so we find it best to not run that while she’s napping/gone to bed.
• Fold and store the laundry immediately – Doing this allows us to keep the laundry area from being cluttered and the small, separated loads make the process much similar rather than first having to sort the clothes and then fold, hang and store them.
• Keep the laundry area neat and tidy – By keeping the laundry area neat and minimizing the number of products we have that keeps the area available for folding after the laundry is done. Tide Pods and Gain Flings make this easier. They are just one little pod with detergent, OxiBoost and Febreeze. I’ve found they work great on our workout clothes and colours, getting them clean and smelling fresh. It’s as simple as tossing the pod in the washer with your clothes and starting the wash. Tide Pods and Gain Flings are available at Target.

Do you have any tips to for little changes you’ve made to help make keeping up with housework and parenting easier?

*Message and data rates may apply. 1 message per request. http://m.target.com/spot/sms/coupon-alrts-terms for Terms, Conditions, and Privacy Policy. By texting the key word to us, you agree to receive an autodialed text message from Target at the mobile number from which you sent your request. Consent to receive messages is not a condition of purchase.