Wednesday, November 06, 2013

Hand Wash Only

In my quest to figure out what kinds of clothes I really love and actually wear, I have made some pretty strict requirements about care.  I generally never ever iron anything, and I don't take things to the dry cleaners.  Even remembering not to dry things can make me cranky.  

But I have some sweaters that I love love love and I wear them all the time and they are wool and hand wash only.  So....I've never washed them.  I just wear them to school and come straight home and change and call it good.  But I'm trying to be a grown up and some of them are a couple of years old and (are you really disgusted?  They're cardigans, worn over something else...I know.  It's bad)




So one Saturday MJL had Katie on the tractor and Anna was reading and I just had Jimmy and I ran out of excuses.  I put water and a little soap in this big bowl because I didn't want to wash the sink.  (Normal level of laziness or excessive laziness?  I couldn't decide)



I swished the sweaters around in the water for a while, and then rinsed them out.  When I dumped the bowl, there was a very surprising amount of brown in the bottom.  Huh.  Clothes do actually get dirty!


I just washed two of them.  Baby steps.  


I laid them out to dry on towels on the bed just like I remember my Mom doing.  

It really wasn't bad.  Maybe I'm growing up or something.  

4 comments:

Melanie said...

I'm always scared I'm going to ruin things like this! I don't think it's gross or lazy. :)

Susan said...

I used to handwash my nice sweaters but I get so lazy and there's never a good space in the apartment, so now I wash them on cold on the delicate cycle in the washer and then lay them on towels to dry. So far so good, but I suppose eventually I'll have to graduate to bucket washing. Even if I've just cleaned the sink, I never trust it to be clean enough.

In the Mix said...

I'm with Susan. We have space but I always wash on the delicate or hand wash cycle (my washer is for lazy people). I might have to take different care of things later but for now, it's working.

betsyann said...

Can you do that with wool? I'm so afraid of accidentally felting them.