Gurus- Laundry help

[jubilee]

I was reading in an old post that Beth (egoldbar) said everyone could benefit from the laundry knowledge of moms that cloth diaper... so I am asking for that help for us humble non-cd moms and the other incredible cd moms. And after spending an hour researching the old threads, having this all in one place would be great!

Specifically I'm wondering about volume of clothes in the washer, sorting, pre-treating, type of detergent, what temp of water for wash and rinse, type of fabric softener (if any), do you put the water and detergent in before the clothes or after, speed of the washer, best length of wash cycle, amount of detergent, amount of water, delicates, and everything else...

For drying- air dry vs. machine, heat of dryer, settings like cotton and perma press, tumble speed, softener sheets, when are clothes dry enough vs. overdried, and anything else you can think of!

I just know I am not doing the whole thing right. My clothes look faded very quickly, I always have wrinkles, colors bleed sometimes... My version of sorting is dirty and clean. :) You can see I personally need help, and this subject comes up all the time in the lounge too, and hopefully it will help us all out. Thanks in advance!! (And if there is already a thread that covers this, I'm sorry I missed it in my search!)

[pritchettzoo]

Hmmm...to start, what kind of machine do you have? A friend was having similar problems with her 25+ year old machine and they disappeared when it went on to the appliance center in the sky and was replaced by a shiny new model. :)

I sort colors, whites, towels. Colors (if it's been a while between washings) can be separated into darker (blacks, reds, purples, navy, etc.) and lighter (khakis, light blues, etc.). We use Kirkland's (Costco) fake Tide and Downy Advance. I put in less than half of what is recommended of both, but we don't have hard water. With my old washer, I turned the water on, added detergent, swished the dasher thingie, and then tossed in clothes. Now we have a Neptune frontloader and it has a detergent area where it mixes with the water before going to the clothes. Everything (except diapers and towels) gets washed on cold with a cold rinse. Our whites are almost entirely DH's undershirts and socks, so they get a splash of bleach and hot water every once in a while. The cycles on the Neptune are set based on fabric type, and it's pretty easy; it also automatically sets the water level. Before this washer, I used a regular (permanent press I think) cycle for clothes and a long (cotton/sturdy) cycle for towels and diapers.

Drying clothes--dry on as low of a heat as possible and take them out as soon as it buzzes to prevent wrinkles. Downy Advanced helps with wrinkles too. I use high heat for towels and diapers. Some of my shirts and Gracie's stuff gets air-dried--anything that I don't want to shrink or I think will pill with the rubbing of the dryer.

HTH!
Anna

[rrosen]

Julie,

My routine is very much like Anna's but, without the fancy machine. However, I am a big pretreater, mostly because I am a slob and always have something on my clothes. For pretreating, I love to use Zout or just some Tide. I keep a spray bottle of Zout by the hamper and spray stains before I through clothes in. For tougher stains, like the gross ones Gabrielle always get around the collar of her shirts, I put some Tide, rub and let sit for about 5 mins before I run the wash. For REALLY bad stains I do a HOT soak (over night) with several scoops of Oxiclean. For stains on whites I use a clorox bleach pen. A little dab directly on the stain works great.

I wash almost everything on the Regular cycle on Cold wash/Cold rinse. Towels and sheets are the only exception. I wash those on warm. I dry on the Low setting or hang dry most things. Again, towels and sheets get dried on high.

I can't help much with the wrinkle thing. I am great with stains, terrible with wrinkles. I hate to iron and always look like I slept in my clothes.Sigh

[lizajane]

not really an expert, but here is my 2 cents...

volume: make sure the water covers all the clothes after the machine starts agitating. if clothes stick out above the water line, put in fewer clothes next time.

sorting: i sort by wash temp and color-
dark colors (cold)
light colors (warm-baby clothes go here)
filthy whites that can "take the heat" (hot-occasional bleach)
normal whites (warm-baby clothes go here, too)

pre-treating: i use shout for regular stuff like a little spilled milk or coke, and zout for tough stains like grass, spagetti sauce, mud. and i pre-treat EVERY stain and let the treated article sit outside of the washer while i load the machine- so for 5 minutes.

detergent: tide. just works better, i find. i use 1/4 to 1/2 of a scoop. i guess i usually use 1/3 of a scoop, but i mean 1/3 of the height of the tide scoop and since it gets wider at the top, it is probably not a real third, but less.

temp: see above. hard stains come out best in hot, but hot wears clothes out faster and shrinks them more. cold helps keep colors dark and warm is good for most anything.

fabric softener: don't use it anymore. it causes detergent build up, especially in towels!!! then they stink faster and don't get as clean.

detergent in first, then turn on water, start adding clothes as it loads the water. but i usually let enough water to cover the bottom get in first before i add clothes.

speed/lenth of cycle: i usually use the longest wash for everything because i have a toddler, two dogs, and an engineer who often has meetings at job sites- so my stuff is dirty.

amounts: see above answers

delicates: i use a mesh "fine washables" bag for anything delicate, and i have a "handwash" delicate cycle that i use for "handwash" items. but i don't often wash truly delicate stuff. underwear and bras get tossed in the regular cycle. i use the mesh bag for bras. (which are all pretty boring bras, nothing lacey.)

dryer: high heat for large loads of stuff that won't shrink or can shrink. like stuff i have already dried a million times- tee shirts, jeans, boxers, socks. medium heat for my tees because my arms are too long for most shirts, maternity shirts, etc. low heat for all baby clothes or anything that i know will be too small if it shrinks at all. air dry as much as i can to save energy! my machine is supposed to cut off when stuff is dry, so it won't overdry.

as for wrinkles, you have to take out the load as soon as the dryer shuts off and hang or fold right away. and don't overload, so they can tumble freely and get wrinkles out.

good luck!

[JacksMommy]

You've gotten great advice, I just wanted to add that rich colors (and anything garment-dyed) tend to fade more easily and are best washed in cold water and dried on low heat. Generally I just wash everything in cold water unless it seems like it's not doing the trick for some item, then I might do a special warm water wash. This works well because it saves me from having to endlessly sort stuff and most clothes instructions recommend cold water anyway. As for sorting, it sounds like some people have very advanced systems (I'm impressed!), I pretty much just sort light and dark (with the occasional white/bleach/high heat wash for DH's t-shirts and our white socks; I wash CDs separately, usually). If the color is at all dark, then it goes in the dark wash. The main thing is to protect your lighter clothes from getting bled on. The bleeding is not enough to affect other dark clothes. If an item has any white or very light in it (collar, stripes, etc) then put it in with the lights - it should be colorfast since otherwise it would bleed on itself (hee hee). Good luck!

Laurel
WOHM to Jack, 6/4/02
EDD baby girl 12/24/02