Laundry Basket Case Goes Beserk (sometimes)

Greetings on a Monday!
Before we get to our Letter of the Day, I have an important announcement to make.  Connecting Now has been chosen as the first blog to be featured on Timmy Boyle's Mix and Mingle Mondays.  Woo-Hoo!  We are going places!  Stop by this comedian's blog and take a gander.  http://www.insidetimmysmind.com/  Oh, and tell him you want my name added to that shirt.  Better yet, demand it.

Now to our letter:

Dear Miss Lisa and the Whipper-Snapper (just how young ARE you anyway?

So I'm kind of moody. Which means that what bothers me today may not bother me tomorrow. But watch out next week, cause I'm gonna fly off the handle. This is something I'm working on. I've been working on it so long that I've almost started accepting it as my thorn, ya know? (I'm pretty sure that's not what Paul meant by that whole passage, but it does help me feel better...)

And I love my husband. Not in the moody kind of way - really truly, icky, sappy, 4ever, etc. Like all married couples, there are some things he does that drive me mad, like that crazy, bonkers, gouge out your eye feeling. (Sorry about the excessive descriptions. It will give you some fodder for Ripping apart . . .er . . . advising me.)

So here's my question. There is this thing that he does fairly consistently. And at times, sad to say, I freak out. Other times I simply sigh and keep my big, flapping mouth closed. Still other times I laugh about it all. (Told you I was moody.) And the few times I've told my gal pals about this problem, they look at me like I have three heads and start gumming off about their won husbands, yadda, yadda, yadda. Apparently I shouldn't complain. So why do I feel so angry about it all sometimes?

What he does is this. He seems to find the day when I'm busiest - like working all day or taking the kids to something for hours or grocery shopping, you get the idea. A day when I do NOT have a spare moment. Then he decides it's time to "help" with laundry. And this is what constitutes help in his warped world. He puts the clothing in the washer - check. Then into the dryer - check, check. And then, because he's being so stinking helpful, he piles the clothing on the floor in front of the drier or across the mudroom. Every so often there is a laundry basket at the bottom. Most times, not. He says that he "doesn't fold."

You can imagine what happens to those clothes by the time I get to them (sometimes the next day or even two days later). We have kids, so the volume is high. As is the compression of the clothing. He jokingly calls it the "cube," which happens to be the general shape it is in until I move the lot onto our living room floor and begin my two hours of folding, etc.

I'm getting steamed just writing this. But my good ole' wifely side says I should be happy he's helping. Grateful even. I've calmly explained to him the hassle and mess that it makes, which generally results in a blank look and a shrug. Sigh.

He's a good man. I don't want to shove laundry down his throat until he promises never to "help" again. Really, I don't. Help me to deal, help me to get past this. Please.

Signed,
Moody and Married With Mucho Laundry
P.S. (not to go with the coNUNdrum - I became a follower today through a link from Timmy Boyle's FB page. Just FYI)

Dear Moody and Married with Mucho Laundry,
Sadly, Maddie is unavailable for consultation on this coNUNdrum, but hopes you'll understand, and truly appreciates your inclusionary salutation.  She also says you should know better than to ask a woman her age.  Now back to your letter:

This cannot go on! My own pulse accelerated as your woeful tale unfolded—no pun intended. That you can EVER keep your lips from flapping, that you can EVER laugh about it, puts you on a higher rung of the wifely ladder than I could ever be. Scrunched up or trampled laundry is a travesty.


I, personally,  didn't have any coNUNdrums with my laundry routine till about a year ago when two things happened—almost simultaneously. Spencer, the boy child, began doing his own laundry, and Maddie married Aaron.  Alas, my laundry empire crumpled.  Hard.


Case #1. Spencer-age 20. He likes to wait till he's down to zero t-shirts and has one hour before he needs to leave the house. He crams the washer with whites, colors, knits, and wovens. The moment the wash cycle is done, he removes the laundry I've got going in the dryer so he can put his in. He squashes my laundry into one of the basement office armchairs—EVEN IF IT'S STILL DAMP. Everything, from shirts to socks, acquires permanent wrinkles.  Can I be blamed for my ensuing maniacal behavior?


Case #2. Aaron-age 27. Maddie and Aaron bring their laundry to our house on Sundays. He enjoys helping in a honeymoonish kind-of-way. Love all that cheerfulness.  Unfortunately, Aaron followed Spencer's example, and while my clothes were dry, they still ended up in a swirled-up wad on the office chair.


I wasn't as maniacal with Aaron as I was still interested in making a good impression.  I pleaded with him, numerous times in an almost normal way  to bring the laundry upstairs.  It was to no avail. Maddie would stand on the sidelines shrugging, smiling. One day she said, "You know, Mom—Aaron didn't have a drier. They hung their clothes on a line." Well, she could've given me that nugget a little sooner. And so I realized it really had been my fault—that Aaron hadn't been trained, but had simply (like a duckling)  "imprinted" off of Spencer.  Never a good thing.


Here's the way I like to do things at the "critical" point in the laundry cycle. The clothes come out of the drier (after a five minute "fluff" if they've been there a while). They get taken to the chaise lounge in the living room where I fold and stack clothes into "owner" piles. "Owners" put their own laundry away. I explained this to Aaron. Then I demonstrated. I told him if he just brings the laundry up, I'll fold it and stack it. Then I supervised while he "tried" the system out.  He was such a cheerful trooper.


Explain, Demonstrate, Supervise—the three steps in training. Six months later, Aaron's at about a 75% success rate. Spencer is a LOST cause and woe to a future wife.  Sam leaves the laundry alone unless he gets specific instructions from me about a particular load. He's a notorious "shrinker"—another issue all together.


So, Moody, I suggest you designate a specific place (not your living room floor) for the laundry to go when it comes out of the dryer. A mostly unused tabletop is ideal. You can purchase a folding table—pun intended—for about $25 from Lowes. Label it, "FOLDING TABLE" for reinforcement. Even if DH doesn't fold, show him how to lay the key pieces out so they don't get wrinkled before you can get to it. Tell him how great it would be if he became a "putter awayer" of the laundry—that's actually the hardest part of the job. Explain all of this. Demonstrate all of this. Supervise all of this. REPEAT as neccessary.  And then don't forget to reward him:). 

I empathize and  wish  you well, Moody.  I really do.  While your current situation has spun out of control, don't despair.  Eventually kids will grow, laundry reduction will occur and your moods along with your bathroom rug should center just fine.   Maybe.

Well, Readers?  What's your spin?  And don't forget to go over to Timmy's blog and demand I be put on the shirt.