Good Intent Becomes Success

"Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing, and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God"  D&C 109:8

I really like to be organized, but it doesn't always "stick". Why? Oh, reasons like it takes too much time, laziness, other things come up that take time away, bad habits, priorities, or the system just doesn't work. I've gone through times of excitement when I come up with a new system to organize the closet, or the desk, or the socks, or the plastic containers in the kitchen. Good intentions should be my mantra. I really do have them, but the a fore mentioned reasons seem to turn good intentions into non-existence. 

We have ten people in our family. Thus, laundry is a mammoth undertaking. I won't get started on the philosophy that a washing machine and dryer caused us to have more clothes as a society which now makes the laundry task completely time-consuming. If I did it all at once (which I do not), it would take a complete 14 hour day, just like it did the Bostonian women of the 1700s when they dedicated every Monday to laundry day. It's no different for us. We just have more dirty clothes to deal with. And compared to the days of old, our clothes aren't even that dirty. OK - I'll stop now.

Back to organizing.... there is one organizational system that has NOT gone by the wayside. I have successfully used it for years, and it has kept my laundry room running efficiently. (If the darn washing machine and dryer could just go faster, this part of my family responsibilities would really be in control. Maybe some day I'll have a second dryer! Now that would be a blessing!!) It's my laundry-sorting system that keeps clothes organized into colors, avoiding piles of clothes on the floor or sorting through multiple dirty clothes baskets to find enough whites to make a full load.

Six separate baskets keep clothes sorted and organized.

Labeled signs let all ages know which clothes go where.

It consists of six tall laundry hampers, labeled with names and pictures to distinguish what type of clothing belongs where. I separate the clothes into Darks, Lights, Whites, Jeans, Towels, and Bedding.

Our family laundry process goes like this:

One person is the designated "gatherer and sorter". He or she gathers all of the dirty laundry from each room, takes it down to the laundry room, and sorts it into the above laundry hampers. This is supposed to be a daily occurrence. Note the word "supposed". Even my four year old knows which clothes go where. No, she can't read yet, but she looks at the pictures and deposits the clothes into the correct bin. I've even seen her match up the clothing color to the color square on the sign to make sure she gets it right.

Since I'm the only one home during the day that is old enough to start laundry, I'm the designated one to wash and dry. Once the clothes are dry, I recruit all available troops to fold. Each person puts away their own piles of clean laundry.

Looking at my signs, I think it's time to upgrade; we need some new clip art and an upgraded font! Who says the laundry room has to be boring and drab?

That's my successful, organizational system for handling the immense volume of dirty laundry in the Bushman home. I'll give myself a pat on the back for actually "sticking" to it. It feels good to be organized in one area of my life, even if it's just dealing with dirty clothes. Now I just need to come up with a scheme for those sneaky and scrupulous socks. Any ideas?

More to Come...but until then, Stick-to-it!