Laundry Salvation

So excited about my new laundry system.  Small, home-making victories that matter!!!!

I have discussed my laundry battles before. Some woes are perpetual. I think, however, that this time I have the upper hand with my clever new scheme. On the weird side....it involves five million laundry baskets....on the plus side, its a LOT more organized, somewhat perpetually caught up, and it makes me feel like a mommy-rock star!!!

 

 

I have baskets for sorting the laundry and all the dirties get put immediately into one of these bins as soon as they enter the basement laundry zone.  Ru has just started learning to load the washer or dryer and having sorted bins of dirties makes it a much saner process. He just stuffs the washer full with his chosen color (I sort whites, lights, darks and reds) and then I add soap or bleach and start the machine when I get a chance. 

 

After washing and drying, all laundry gets folded and sorted into the next bank of baskets, labelled with names. Each person has a basket, neatly labelled and they stack on top of each other for space saving convenience. Love this part. So soothing to go down in the basement in early morning before the house is awake or late at night when the littles are running around crazily with toothbrushes on the 2nd floor....and just have a little sorting binge.

Just me and the laundry...each thing in its bin, every one folded and ready for putting away.

Dee loves the new system and it is bringing out his inner organizer. He goes energetically down the basement to empty his basket every morning and tells me several times a week how much he loves the new plan. Cute little kindred spirit. I am a mess on the outside and full of spontaneous creativity but I have a strong inner craving for order and aesthetic smoothness. Dee and child-me are a lot alike. 

 

Pretty Hunky Dory!

Life is just pretty good around here lately. We are into the thick of summer, the lazy hazy days when things tend to whirl so fast that eventually it all becomes one numbing, blind blur of basil scented, cicada accompanied pleasure. I know that this mad pace isn't sustainable, eventually I will fatigue and begin stumbling around panting but no worry, summer doesn't last long in our climate, just a short phase and pretty soon we'll be all cozy hearth fires and knitted throws. We are spending many evenings at the pool, eating and making lots of ice cream, running around outdoors, shirking the dishes, and eating, eating, eating. We're to the part of the year with the really great food.

I am thinking about where to go for our annual peach picking venture, wondering when we can get out to pluck wineberries from a right-of-way and thinking a little about the tomato sauce canning in my future to boot. Mmmmm.....

Here's a short photo tour of the high points of recent days:

Fresh guacamole...these sorts of things can be a whole meal lately. They are so fresh and juicy.

 

There are tasty, crisp carrots now at our CSA. Last week it was take-as-many-as-you-want-of-the-carrots day and we loaded up. Carrots are one of those things that taste completely different when just pulled from the ground.

That's "our" farm

I put organizing bins above the bookcase to contain the flotsom and jetsom that lives there

Love them! 

We have two monarch caterpillars living in a jar on our counter! (one already in chrysalis!)

I made ravioli. (Check Check on the New Year's Resolutions List!)

Ru "reads" to Dee now. I melt.