Laundry

Most mornings, Kate wakes before I do. I know this because I usually awaken to find her face directly over my face which is still happily snuggled into my pillow. At the moment I open my eyes she asks, "Mom, is my (fill in the blank with the shirt du jour) clean yet?" She asks this question because she has already been to the clothes dryer to check the mornings latest offerings and has not yet found the "perfect" outfit.

There was a span of a few weeks this winter when I thought that my dryer was broken. Every few loads I would open the door to find damp clothes. I was puzzled because every load was not performing that way, yet some loads were still damp. I tried and tried to discover the pattern leading to the problem: Was it happening with just the towels, just the blue jeans, the white load? There was no rhyme or reason to the dryer dilemma. Finally, one day while I was in a far corner of the basement, I heard those famous size 12s coming down the stairs. Kate marched to the running dryer, popped open the door, and checked inside to see if anything she was interested in was trapped inside. Finding nothing of note, she slammed the door, turned on her heel and marched back up the stairs, leaving a stopped dryer full of damp clothes in her wake. Ah ha!!


After many such days of unsuccessful dryer fishing, Kate spent a day pestering me about one certain shirt that is in her favorites category of late. After I could stand no more badgering about the laundry from a 4 year old, I told her if she asked about that shirt one more time, she wouldn't see it for a week. Kate took the warning very seriously and waited about thirty minutes before saying with a very serious tone, "I hope that tomorrow there are some better choices in my drawer!"

I'm not much of a laundry goddess as it is. I've really tried. I even read three books about laundry, yes, laundry 2 summers ago. I've read all about other's systems and tips and tricks galore. Unfortunately, there's little help for the laundry challenged. There is however, a great helper. Mom travelled 2 hours a few days ago to help me with the laundry. When she left, the laundry was all but finished. The children each had a turn with Grandma's attention, and I had a fresh resolve to keep the laundry caught up over the summer so that next visit we can play the whole time!!