To start the season off right you should run a damp cloth along the full length of your line to get off all the dirt, including bird poop. Why you ask? Because this only takes about 2 minutes but is well worth the effort. You don’t want your nice clean laundry to have lines of dirt on it, do you?
Make sure your clothesline is tight and you have spacers to add along the way. As your line gets heavy it will sag and these will give it a lift. I have three of the kind with rollers top and bottom and I use them every time because my line is quite long.
I have to say that I love my clothes line. It has a boat winch system that lowers the front pulley to make loading the line easier and then raises it back up again to get the clothes up off the ground. Hubby is a genius! Oh wait, that may have been my idea. What a team we make!!!
Now that I have given you this bit of information it’s time to hang out the laundry. Whites should be washed first and hung out before darks because the laws of science have whites taking longer to dry. Darks or colours next, it really doesn’t matter which.
Take notice of which way the wind is blowing. Hang your button-down shirts, un-buttoned, with the fronts facing the direction from which the wind is blowing. This will encourage the wind to puff out the shirts. This means no ironing. The Witch hasn’t ironed in years. Hang all your shirts out by their tails in case you get any stretching. Nothing looks dumber than pointy shoulders.
I hang all our laundry out, even underwear. We have no neighbors to speak of but even at the old house I would still hang it all out. Really, we all wear it (usually) so why be embarrassed? And mine is so cute (too much information) according to Hubby.
I hang all our towels out also and then if they feel scratchy I just pop them in the dryer for 5 min to fluff them up. The wind here has usually taken care of that problem.
These are just some of my tips and I hope they help everyone take one more step in saving the environment. Look closely at your next electric bill to see how much you have saved, too.
By the way, I don’t usually recommend a product but I have been using a great fabric softener and I think it is worth mentioning Ultra Gain Original Fresh.
The order of the clothing is important too. I can still hear my grandmother commenting on how people hung their clothes out, and if it was sloppy or not. Clothes lines used to tell people who was expecting a new baby but the diapers and layette hanging out.According to my grandmother, towels were to be hung out smallest to largest, pants, then shirts, etc. I follow her lead and do the same! I love driving by homes and seeing clothes hanging on the line and everything is in order. Sometimes if the clothes are hung out unorganized, i have an urge to pull over and fix it ( but I never do).
ReplyDeleteThe best feeling of all, going to sleep at night with sheets that were dried outside!
To start, I somehow missed the post with all your pictures of your island--What a beautiful place that you call home!!
ReplyDeleteI thought of you today when I hung some rugs and my curtains out to dry because of my "clothes-pins." Then when I saw your post, it gave me a bit of a grin because of what I accidentally put my rug onto!! But along with your pins, you truly have the Ferrari in clothes-lines too!! Hope you're well, and having a good weekend!!
Ok I admit I don't always follow clothesline etiquette to the letter! My mom is somewhat fussy, but some of the things I'd never heard about, like the direction of the wind for the shirts, etc. And for us, towels go first, then the hand ones, then face cloths :-)
ReplyDeleteI always, always, always fluff up my stuff when it comes out, sometimes less than 5 minutes, but I hate putting on anything that's stiff.
The Witch, you have a fantastic setup!!
Love this post. We grew up in the country and Mom always hung out the clothes on the line to dry. But underwear stayed close to the house so peeps driving by couldn't see them! I miss having a clothes line in the city; there's nothing like having your sheets smell of fresh air (not sure how fresh they'd be in the city, come to think of it!).
ReplyDeleteBoy...do I remember the "rules of hanging laundry". In Japan though-you would be the talk of the town of people saw your underwear! They usually hang underwear inside on little carousel-type hangers that hold about a dozen pairs at one time. I learned that rule the HARD way-'bout got my head ripped off by my mother-in-law for hanging everyone's knickers out for the neighbors to see....lol
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