How many of you are like me and do laundry only when you’ve run out of clean underwear? 🙂

Photo credits | Permissions

Here I share 8 life hacks for laundry.

1. Take a cue from Linda Cobb, the “Queen of Clean.”  Every now and then, remove buildup from your washing machine by filling the tub with hot water and adding a cup of white vinegar to the water.  Run as usual.
2. Remove blood stains by pre-treating with a stain stick like Resolve Spray n Wash.  The enzymes break down the blood. It’s best if the blood stains are relatively fresh.
3. Use less detergent than recommended on the label.
4. Use hot water to dissolve powder detergent.
5. Soak soiled clothing before reaching the maximum water level, stop the washer, and let it sit.  The detergent is more concentrated.
6. Put matching socks into mesh bags to keep them together.
7. Wash delicates separately from the rest of your clothing.  Run them in either the delicates or hand-washables cycle.  I use Forever New, which a salesgirl at Trousseau, a lingerie store in Northern Virginia, recommended for washing delicates. I don’t know if Woolite has changed its formulation, but I quit using it because its fragrance was too strong.  I have separate mesh bags for bras, hosiery, and silk pillowcases (an indulgence).  Choose the absolute finest mesh for bras: on more than one occasion, the hooks have gotten entangled with the mesh bag, and all I could do was to cut the mesh.
8. Remove clothing piece by piece from the washing machine, shake out each piece, and then put it into our clothes dryer.  More surface area, don’t cha know??  Popular Mechanics says that it’s difficult to detect a noticeable difference when using dryer balls (aside from extra noise).

I have not tried the KonMari approach to folding clothes, but since Marie Kondo is from Japan, I liken it to origami.  Profiling! 🙂 There are nearly 400 holds on The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing before I can check it out from my local library.