mountain of clothes?

Question

what is the easiest way to fold and organize a mountain of clothes all over the bedrooms? i don't know why this is such a difficult task for me to do.... any ideas on how i keep my clothes more orgnanized....

Answer 1

Laundry is such a pain in the butt for me too... What I usually do is pile all the clothes and towels (everyting basically) onto my bed... as it is high off the floor.. then I seperate everything, stacking and smoothing shirts on top of shirts and pants on top of pants, keeping them seperate as to who they belong to.. then I fold all the towels and stack them too.. and I pile all the socks and underwears in a big pile.. ( I sort through those later).. Then I get all my hangers and run hangers through all thing that need to be hung up... after I hang everything up, I go back and fold what and put away what goes into the dressers, and last I sort socks ( I sit down while doing this).. And then I put the towels in the linen closet.... I try and put things away as they finish drying, and I try to do laundry each time there is enough for a load... so that I don;t get behind and overwhelmed... I still HATE laundry though... It is probably the easiest chore, but it sucks... lol.. I hope this gives you an idea....

Answer 2

Your just going to have to tackle it and start folding as soon as they come out of the dryer. Then put them away. By they time you get done with that load the next load will be done and keep it up till all the clothes are folded.

But to help manage your laundry don't let it pile up. Have a hamper for each bedroom/person. When the hamper is full, time to wash, dry, fold and put them away.

Best of luck

Answer 3

Hang shirts, dress pants , dresses, skirts, and jackets in the closets. Fold the rest and put them in dressers. Fold and hang things as they come out of the dryer to keep from creating the mountains. All of the things that are in the piles may now be wrinkled. I would put them in the dryer with a damp washcloth. The moisture from the washcloth should steam out most of the wrinkles.

Answer 4

1.Fold or hang them straight out of the dryer
2.fold directly into laundry basket and then take to bedroom and put away immediately
3.install double hanging rods in closets for more room
4. give clothes to Goodwill..do you really need all of them?

Answer 5

keep them in a laundry basket or hamper when they are dirty. after you wash them fold them and put them in a basket. for the ones you hang up put them on a hanger and hang them up right away.

Answer 6

Sounds to me like you are dealing with clutter. Wardrobe and linen closet are synonyms for laundry, did you ever consider this?

Having a vast closet of garments, and excessive linens, means you are washing alllllll the time. If you cut back on the amount of these things, then the worst case scenario will become more manageable.

You have heard this before: pare down.

Get rid of anything that:

Doesn't fit or isn't flattering for YOU
Needs repairs that you will not make
Is hopelessly out of style
Doesn't work with anything else you have
Is harder to maintain than you are willing to do
Is so ragged it should not be worn anymore.

*Notice, I did not say to get rid of stuff that you just don't wear. Maybe it is just hidden, or you haven't found a way to use it. It may end up in the GO pile but you can give it a chance if it is a basic piece that you like.

What you do to get these things out of your closet is up to you: sell, throw away, recycle for crafts or quilts, donate. But don't consider them part of your wardrobe anymore.

There is good news though. You can pare down MORE (even your "undecided" pile doesn't all have to go for good) by taking things you own and intend to wear OUT of circulation for a while. They are still yours, they will serve a purpose, they are just not in the everyday jumble or hanging on the rod, taking up everyday space.

You can do this with:

Seasonal clothes
Handmedown kids clothing that doesn't fit anyone NOW but will.
These come OUT of storage when needed.

You can also do this with multiples of similar garments, breaking down into independently functional mini-collections and rotating all but ONE into storage.

You might classify similar types of

garments: tees, jeans, socks, underwear, tanks, hoodies, dresses.

occasions to wear: work, play, camping/dirty jobs, sleep, sports

color families

or assemble smaller in season whole wardrobes and move them in and out of storage in such a way that EVERYTHING you are wearing changes. This would be a nice variety of stuff that works well together and can work without anything else you have stored away...Make your swaps on a day that ALL the laundry is done.

The point of all this is that you only need a fraction of the clothing you probably have. It may sound like a stifling of your expression to get rid of things but your ability to be creative actually increases. Timeless, versatile separates give you more options than trendy ones. They work HARDER for you, and take up less space.

For instance, if you have a 10 tops that are not meant to be layered, have a bunch of outlandish patterns or colors, those pieces only present ONE way to use them, the only option is to change up the bottoms that you wear them with, and possibly the occasion. And you wouldn't want to wear these 10 tops all the time, so you would have to have more tops, for variety.

However, here are ten more tops that work HARD. Samples, do what you like. In my examples, half of each would be a neutral, and half would be a color.

3 button down shirts or blouses
3 tanks or shells
2 cardigans
2 blazers

Now look what happens. Almost any two colors can make a new look. Any button down can be worn as a first or second layer. Any first layer can be worn alone or with any second layer. Combine for hundreds of different looks, add different accessories to dress up or down or tie different color combos together.

That is a lot of mileage from 10 hangers worth of clothes. Hope that is an incentive to declutter your closet of garments that don't earn their keep.

(Gosh, I hope you are patient with long answers)

Moving on to the linen closet, check in all your sheets and trade them in for WHITE sheets, cotton, in the very highest thread count you can afford? Why? They are more readily available, you can get very very high quality for better prices, and you can wash them together. Decorate with blankets and comforters and others

ONE set of daily sheets per bed, TWO sets max for any bedwetter's beds...consider dispensing with flat sheets if you have duvets or like a more snuggly cover such as a fleece blanket (makes the bed easier to make in the morning too. Wash them and put them back on the bed.

For cushion on those stomach flu nights, get flat sheets in the size that fits the largest bed of your home, you can hospital tuck them around any sized mattress to get you through the night. ONE of these sheets per bed in your house.

For table and kitchen linens consider dispensing with everyday table cloths and go with placemats. A worthy investment: white cloth napkins. 10 per family member. High quality ones pay for themselves over time and a lifetime supply of these takes up ONE large kitchen or buffet drawer, you would fill a whole room of a lifetime supply of paper napkins. You can have a lot of these and still not equal one load of laundry, and you can have a soak bucket under the kitchen sink going, where you put them until they are laundered. Keep a handful of white bar towels, and switch from cloth potholders to trivets and silicone mitts.

For bathroom linens, 2 sets of towels per person in the home, 2 sets for guests and you can color code them for each person, or each bathroom. You could switch from washcloths to plastic poofs. Teach fam members to hang and reuse their towels as there is a limited supply.

Re: color coding, it helps if all your different colors can wash together. All pastels, or all brights. Or you can go with WHITE monogrammed towels across the board...again the higher quality you get, the longer you will use them. If you color code by person, they can keep their OWN towels in their OWN rooms, rather than taking space in the bathrooms for towel storage.

Another tidbit of advice, is to code socks and underwear for each person in the house. These pieces do NOT have to be a big production, they are BASICS. Each family member gets about 10 identical pairs of white socks. You can make sorting easier by shopping for each person separately re: brands and small details. Dad gets Fruit of the Loom with the gray toe and green stitching. Son 1 gets Hanes with the white toe and the red stitching, son 2 gets white ankle socks. Daughter 1 gets white slouch socks, daughter 2 gets white anklets with lace trim. Mom gets white tube socks with the pink stitching in the toe. See how it all washes together but sorts FAST? With underwear, children can all go with a certain theme: son 1 gets superheros, son 2 gets sports, daughter 1 gets Barbie, daughter 2 gets Disney Princess. Teens and parents can have their own signature design. Just make it a RULE that undies are not for artistic expression.

OK...so if you follow this advice, you can simplify a LOT of laundry situations.

From there, make a daily habit of gathering laundry (or make it a daily task for everyone to bring their laundry) from around the house and sorting it. If you have a full load, do it from start to finish...wash, dry or hang, iron, fold or hang, put away. Then the mountain doesn't even START to grow. Wash sheets on a certain day of every other week, and wash other bedding on a certain day of every other month. Use febreze in between.

If you are catching up with a mountain of laundry, keep both machines working hard. If you use liquid fab softener, you can skip the dryer for things like linens and hang them to dry. When the washer is done, don't wait for the dryer to flip it. Even baskets of wet clothes get a little dryer while they wait for a tumble and it ends up taking less time, I know I have tried it! Let the wet clothes pile up.

One load to sort out in particular and get OUT of your way, if they are similar in color, all the tiny pieces like socks and underwear that don't have to be attended to right away. Start a bin as they finish and match socks and start piles for each person at the end. Wash them all at once, they dry faster and don't get caught up in pantlegs and sheet corners.

Sort by colors but also by maintenance. You might have a load to FOLD, a load to HANG, a load to IRON, a load that AIR dries..this way you know how much attention it needs as soon as that dryer buzzes. Also means you are doing similar tasks all at once rather than mingling them together. You can get an assembly line feel from repeating actions, they become easier and quicker.

Move through with bedding, keep running it through, it tends to dry pretty fast, and you can hang it.

Alternate starting the "needs attention" loads, and the "dump and do later" loads for less interruption of your day. Alternate heavier fabrics with quick dry fabrics or hang dry to even out drying times.

Use hampers without lids, they are easier to use...toss and go instead of walking over, removing the lid, adding the laundry, replacing the lid. This may be all the incentive you need to keep dirty clothes off the floor. A hamper doesn't have to be fancy, a dollar store laundry basket?

Keep hampers in each bedroom, each bathroom, one near the kitchen. Again, check them daily. A single hamper for unsorted in each of these places, and a sorting hamper in the laundry room to hold laundry that is waiting for a load to do it.

You can probably work yourself into a routine of doing a certain number of loads each day, again, start to finish, and stay on top of laundry with a minimum of hassle, you just pick it up as a habit.