The laundry can be really wild and woolly here.  Its probably that way at your house too. It just gets out of control so easily. Stains that won’t come out, mold or mildewy smells, ring around the collar… they all rear their ugly heads even after the clothes have been washed sometimes.

I’ve found a few ways to conquer the wild laundry. It starts with my arsenal of chemicals.  Yeah, that doesn’t sound too good.  It starts with my cleaning products.

Bleach –
Ah, bleach. What did we ever do without you? I heart bleach. I don’t go crazy with it, but there are simply some things  I would never have been able to get clean without it. It kills mold and mildew and if I am sure to rinse it out of your clothing well, it doesn’t usually make any of us itch or break out.

Borax –
If you can’t use bleach for some reason, Borax works almost as well at getting out mildew or mold smells. Good stuff.  I always keep it on hand but its for making homemade laundry soap.

Homemade Laundry Soap –
I don’t always get this made when I need it so I sometimes purchase commercial soap. You can find my recipe here. I am working on another, creamy recipe and will post that when I get time! Homemade soap doesn’t suds. I’ve made it with coconut oil and that will suds, but its expensive.  Homemade soap is actually soap, not detergent. It works extremely well and is very inexpensive to make. The key to success with homemade soap, and not causing your whites to be gray or dingy is to rinse it out WELL.

Stain Removers –
I keep Lestoil on hand for greasy stains. If you put it in an old dish soap bottle or other squeeze bottle, you can direct it onto stains. My husband can be messy eater, and he works with grease and oil at work so he gets greasy. Lestoil works.
Fels Naptha is great for stains, but its easier to use the Lestoil because its liquid. Fels van be wet and then rubbed onto stains before washing.  I don’t use commercial stain removers any more. They are extremely expensive and I have bleached too many spots on clothes using it.

Fabric Softener – I really like Classic Downy. But they’ve messed with it so much over the years that its not the same. So I just choose to use white vinegar. The vinegar rinses out of the clothes, doesn’t leave a smell and makes the clothes very soft. However…..
In the winter time, I use dryer sheets. I cut the sheets into thirds and use 1/3 of a sheet for each load. That small piece of a dryer sheet is enough to keep static out of the clothes. And its not enough to leave much of a smell.

You can also use white vinegar for a rinse aide.  Vinegar will help the fabrics release the detergent or soap you used to wash. Getting rid of all the soap or detergent is crucial to good results after washing. Once vinegar opens up the fibers of the fabric, the fabric feels softer, too. Vinegar is cheap and won’t leave an odor after its rinsed out.

Other things I need for doing laundry:

A few good soaking pans – I use my large stainless steel canning pans. I have some plastic ones too. I soak a lot of clothes to remove stains. I also hand-wash a lot of clothes like lingerie, delicate blouses, etc.

A Drying Rack – I am rack-less right now but I am looking at one to purchase. I don’t care for the wooden ones that are free-standing, they get black and weak pretty quickly. I like wooden ones that are attached to the wall, but where in the world would I hang one in this house? So the search continues. Right now I hang a lot of clothes on clothes-hangers in the bathroom and outdoors.

A Clothes Dryer – Mine belonged to the country music star, Mel Tillis. Seriously. It was purchased at his yard sale many years ago. That’s odd to you? I guess its one of the perks of living near Nashville, Tennessee. We’re all just neighbors here. I can still hear sequins tossing around in the vent.

A good, hot dryer is an essential. I guess you could survive without one, I’ve gone long periods of time without one.   Did you know that you can actually kill germs on towels and other clothing by running them through a very hot dryer? You don’t want to over-do it but a good dryer that has a temperature control is a real essential, especially if you have children.

So that’s what laundry essentials are to me.  I can clean most anything with these items.  I’ve had some really bad stains in the years past. Things like tar or rumen fluid (don’t ask just google it). For those stains I’ve had to purchase some commercial solvents. What are your laundry essentials?

Next time ….. “How To Manage The Sheer Volume of Laundry!”