As a pre-teen and teenager one of my chores was to help with the laundry. Living with five siblings, three of which were boys, meant there was a lot of dirty laundry. Many days during the summer my mom would send my sister and I out to hang up the wet laundry and bring in the dry items. I like to imagine I was a beautiful Amish lady with lots of little children, or a strong pioneer lady on my way to a new home in Montana. Some days I just pretended I was a normal momma with wild little boys running underfoot.
Here I am. Living what I once dreamed. I have my husband, my little boys, who can be wild at times, and a beautifully large clothesline my husband made me.
While we are in the process of surviving toddlerhood and raising our family, we want to teach our boys to be responsible. Responsible in their work and play, responsible with their friendships and their money.
Drying our laundry on the line is one way we can be responsible with our money. God gave us the beautiful sunshine, so why not use it? He also gave us bodies to exercise and take care of, and I personally think, hanging laundry on the line can be a workout. Especially when the spinner on the washing machine isn’t working, it has a mind of its own, and you have dripping towels and blankets to wrangle over the line.
Drying clothes, diapers, underwear, socks, towels and whatever else you put through the washing machine saves you money. During the months that I line dry, I pay around $15-$25 less then during the winter when we run the dryer.
Here in Michigan, I’m sure everywhere else as well, weather plays a big part in the length of the line drying season. This year, because of my broken elbow, I didn’t really start hanging things on the line until June. On a good year you might be able to start hanging things out the beginning of May and go until mid October.
Here are some things that I have learned over my years of putting the laundry out to dry. (Thanks mom!)
1. Start a load of laundry the night before. It won’t get smelly, I promise. If you take five minutes to start a load of laundry before you go to bed, you will be ready to get a load on the clothesline first thing in the morning.
2. Watch the weather, but don’t pay too much attention to it. After all the weatherman could be wrong. Unless there is a 70%-80% chance of rain then go ahead and hang your clothes out. {Side note: I used to think Michigan had this cool saying about how you might think you know the weather but if you wait five minutes it will change…turns out pretty much every other state claims a saying just like that. 🙁 I guess we will just have to stick with “If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you.”}
3. Don’t pay for the rain scent laundry detergent when you can get it for free. Don’t spend money on the special laundry detergent, use your homemade powder and just hang your clothes out on a day it might rain, or if it wasn’t supposed to rain that day and you are gone and it starts to rain, don’t worry about all your laundry on the line, they are getting an extra tense cycle and you’ll get great smelling sheets. As a bonus if you leave your laundry out in the rain you won’t have to iron.
4. Connect the items you are hanging at the corners. You will be able to use less clothespins this way. Instead of two clothespins for one shirt you can hang three shirts with four clothespins.
5. Hang underwear with everything else. Why run the dryer for those socks and undies when you can dry them outside for free? I used to hang all the items I could connect and then the underwear and socks. But if you intersperse those private garments in the other clothes they stick out less and people driving by probably won’t notice.
6. Hang socks in pairs. Again this is a trick that saves clothespins. Bonus for you Momma’s of littles: it saves time, just grab two socks and pin them up.
7. If your clothes aren’t dry before dark, leave them on the clothesline. This is time and money. Why take them.down and put them in the dryer when you could save time by leaving them overnight and let the dry in the morning? Bonus: (don’t you love that. 🙂 ) Your neighbors will think that you are super industrious when they see laundry on the line at 7:30AM.
8. Fold your laundry as you are taking off the line. Why double the work by carrying it into the house and then having to fold it. You get a little extra time outside too, which is good for all you Michiganders, you can soak up a little Vitamin D since you can be deficient after one of our lovely long winters and its lack of sun.
9. Hang in groups. Jeans and pants, socks, clothing and other items that can be connected. It is also easier of you hang them in approximately the same spot every time as well. For example, I use my first three lines for things that can be connected (ie: t-shirts, pillowcases, sheets, towels, cloth diapers, etc), the next line holds socks and other things that can hang on the own, like hand towels with buttons, newborn and infant onsies, rompers, etc, the last line is for pants and jeans. Keeping the lines arranged this way means I don’t have to be moving clothespins around a lot, they are almost always where I need them.
10. If you are worried about the sun fading certain items hang them inside out. We know the sun is good for bleaching out stains, but it can also fade the navy blue of our favorite t-shirt or the hunter green of the hubby’s dress shirt. If you hang those favorite items inside out you will get fading on the inside and your outside she stay the perfect color.
What are your favorite benefits of hanging the wash on the clothesline? Do you have any other tips to share with us?
My mom used to have is hang clothes on the line simply for the fresh scent it gave them. 🙂
I love the scent of clothes off.the line! It is my favorite!
What a beautiful backyard you have!!!
Thanks! We live in the country, sometimes I forget how much yard we really have. 🙂
We do thia over here alll year round. No dryer so clothesline it is!
We could probably do it all year if I wanted, but standing outside at 10° F isn’t somthing.I look forward to. The Amish around here hang theirs all winter, I feel bad for their hands, brrr.
I grew up in a house without a washer and dryer, so everything was handwashed and hung to dry. I’m just too lazy to do this. If the hubby puts up a clothesline in the backyard, I may reconsider. 🙂
Wow! I had to wring a couple things out by hand the other day, talk about aching arms! I can’t imagine doing all the laundry by hand..Thanks for reminding me how blessed I am! 🙂
The only thing that really gets hung on our little clothesline are swimsuits and beach towels to dry before coming into the garage to wait for their turn in the laundry. You have a really nice area for hanging clothes… and a gorgeous backyard! 🙂
~Lorelai
Life With Lorelai
Thanks! We’re country people so we have a larger yard. 🙂
Hey, those beach things have to dry too! I need to get my boys to the beach….
Oh how I wish we lived in a neighborhood or far out in The country where I could hang clothes outside. We would get kicked out of our neighborhood for this! Lol but, I do remember the days of hanging clothes outside with mom. This is such a cool post, reminds me how much I want 5 acres of land to let the kids play free and we can do whatever we want without being bound by stuffy people and hoa’s. 🙂
Maybe someday you will have your dream house. I’m glad this brought back good memories for you. 🙂
I am so glad you did a post on this. I could also!
I think stuff dries more quickly if you give it individual pegs though.
I have a system where I put people’s clothes together. And then when I put them in the basket I put the socks folded together, so I agree about grouping the socks, but separate pegs. I guess though since we are only three people, maybe there is more space!
I take down the things that need ironing last and put them on top.
I hang my delicate bras inside. We only use the dryer when it rains.
You should do a post too! Then we can compare notes more. 🙂 I generally don’t have a problem with items drying, but I usually only connect things if they are lighter fabrics. Heavier, thicker items, like jeans, fleeces and sweaters, I hang separately.
I love your tip about the things that need ironing!
These are great tips! My mom actually has a clothesline, too! Right now in Florida it’s raining every 5 minutes, so I might never get any dry clothes LOL Out of the rainy season, though, this would be great!
I didn’t know Florida had rainy and dry seasons! So how do they fall? Summer and fall are rainy?
Mostly just the summer is rainy. The fall is a bit more dry!
I am mostly used to drying clothes in clothesline when I was in India .Now in New York , I hardly find place to dry the clothes and also we don’t laundry at home and so It is difficult for us 🙁 .Nice tips though :)We follow almost everything you said :)But while drying socks I do it separately instead of pairs 🙂
Ouch, a broken elbow?! 🙁 ((hugs))
This is a great reference for line drying – thank you for sharing!
Great tips!!
My mom had a clothesline and so did my grandmother. I actually think she had one of those sock trees too. Or at least that’s what I called them, I’m not sure of the technical name. We use a dryer but I wouldn’t mind getting a clothesline. These are great tips!
I would love to do this! I live in the suburbs and have a postage stamp backyard. Plus, I think my dogs would rip it down. At the same time, laundry dried by the sun sounds so nice.
Your dogs would have fun chasing the clothes as the wind blows them around. 🙂
I so wish I could do this! We’re not allowed in our neighborhood, but this is just lovely!
I so wish I has space for this!!
Great tips! I have been hanging laundry for years and my biggest challenge was finding a good heavy duty clothespin…I finally found one and it has been such a blessing! http://oursimplelife-sc.com/finally-found-heavy-duty-clothespins/
Thank you! I will have to go check out those pins!
My husband put us up a clothesline this summer. We got our first energy bill 3 weeks later which was about 13% less! I love the savings on the energy bill but strangely, I love hanging clothes on the line. That sunshine fresh smell is wonderful! This is actually the only home I’ve ever lived in without a clothesline.
All of your tips are great! It even sounds fun to hang out the laundry!
My tip is to place a small plastic stool near the clothesline to sit the basket on. I got my little stool at the Dollar General a few years ago for just a few dollars. I have a post on my blog with instructions, tools and supplies for building a clothesline at http://www.intelligentdomestications.com
Thank you for sharing with us at The Home Matters Linky Party. Please come back Wednesday and share more of your great matters of the home posts with us!
I forgot to mention that I LOVE the smell of clothes dried on the line in the fresh air! Thanks so much for coming by and linking up at the #homematters Link Up Party! We hope to see you again this coming Wednesday 🙂