I have been studying abroad since I was 18 years old, and now I have 10 years of laundry experience. I will share with you all the best tips I have. Let's get started now!!
Tip 1. Properly sort your clothes
This is not something too new, but it seems many people still feel a bit confused when it comes to sorting laundry. So here is how you can do it.
Basically, you will sort as follows:
- Wash white clothes together
- Wash light-colored and pastel clothes together
- Wash contrasting light and dark clothes together. That is, on the same item, there are both light and dark colors combined.
- Dark-colored clothes.
- Jeans.
- Brightly colored clothes. For brightly colored clothes, it is best to wash each color separately if you have enough clothes. For example, wash red clothes together, wash green clothes together. But if you have too few items of each color to make a separate wash, you can mix them together.
Sorting clothes like this is crucial to prevent colors from bleeding into each other. No matter how new the clothes are, if they get stained by another color, they are practically ruined and cannot be worn anymore, which is such a waste, right?
Another small tip is that whenever you buy a new brightly colored item, you should wash it by hand once to see how much it bleeds. Usually, high-quality items will not bleed. However, low-quality items often use cheap dyes, and it is very normal for them to bleed in a basin of water. So this is when you need to think carefully whenever you intend to buy a brightly colored item. I understand that not everyone has the money to buy high-quality clothes, but buying a cheap red or green item that dyes 20 other items into a splotchy red is definitely not worth it, right?
Not to mention the health aspect, those dyes, when they come into contact with your skin daily, are definitely not good. Especially many families like to buy colorful clothes for children but only buy cheap items from the market. You need to pay attention to whether those cheap fabric dyes are safe for your child or not? The less money you have, the more you need to think carefully before choosing to buy clothes. Buy less, but ensure they are durable, beautiful, and do not fade, so they can be worn for a long time. After that, apply the sorting method I just mentioned above, and your clothes will last even longer.
Tip 2. Use laundry bags
This is also not something too new, but I still see many families often forget. A laundry bag is a mesh bag with a zipper that is sold a lot in supermarkets. I am still using the laundry bag I bought at the supermarket many years ago. Or now there are more environmentally friendly mesh laundry bags than plastic ones, which you can find at eco-friendly stores.
There are 3 types of items that you need to put in a laundry bag every time you do laundry:
The first type is underwear and socks; these items are very small, and when you put them all in one laundry bag, they won't scatter everywhere, making them hard to find. Especially children's socks, as they are too small, they often get stuck in the rubber ring of the front-loading washing machine. Putting them all in a laundry bag makes it much easier to hang and store them afterward. For women's bras with underwire and padding, there is a special type of laundry bag with a frame and padding to maintain the shape of the bra. The bras will not get crushed or lose their shape. That is the first type of item you need to put in a laundry bag.
The second type is thin and easily snagged items, such as thin sweaters or silk blouses. Many types of clothing will definitely have hard details like buttons or zippers, and you don't want those to snag the thin items when the washing machine spins because it mixes everything together.
The third type is long pants or long scarves. If you don't put long, thin items in a laundry bag separately, they will get tangled with other items while the washing machine spins, leading to stretching.
So those are the 3 types of clothes you need to put in a laundry bag. Using laundry bags correctly will make your clothes last much longer.
Tip 3. How to handle zippers and buttons
Many people overlook this, but it is very important when doing laundry. The rule is as follows: Very simple: "Buttons should be unbuttoned, zippers should be zipped." The reason you should unbutton shirts and pants when washing is to prevent the fabric from being pulled on both sides of the button, while zippers should be zipped up because an unzipped zipper can easily snag other items. It's that simple. Buttons should be unbuttoned, and zippers should be zipped up.
Tip 4. You should wash clothes in cold water
Many of you, and I myself have thought that washing in hot water is the only way to get clothes clean. However, this is just a feeling. I have been washing clothes in cold water for a long time now, and the clothes are still perfectly clean. Washing clothes in cold water has 2 benefits:
- First, it protects clothes, making them last longer. For certain types of fabric, hot water can break down the structure of the fibers, and you will see the clothes getting worn out and stretched faster.
- Second, washing in cold water also saves energy, which can lead to a slightly lower monthly electricity bill. Those are the reasons you should wash clothes in cold water.
After washing clothes, you should air dry them instead of using a dryer. I know that using a dryer is very convenient and quick, and it looks better than hanging clothes all over the house, right? However, the heat from the dryer can damage clothes quickly. During my time studying abroad, I moved around a lot and sometimes had no place to hang clothes, so I had to use the dryer. People outside also use dryers a lot. In general, I was very scared because clothes got damaged a lot. The best way is to air dry clothes naturally, which is the best way to keep clothes durable and beautiful for a long time. When hanging clothes, there are a few notes you should remember:
For dark or brightly colored clothes, you should turn them inside out so that the color does not fade in the sun. One of the biggest annoyances for my close friend is buying dark blue shirts or black pants, and after a while, they fade. Of course, I always remember to hang them inside out, but there are other factors that affect the color retention of clothes. But initially, just remember that to keep colored clothes from fading, hang them inside out.
Another note when hanging clothes is for items that are prone to stretching. Especially for sweaters, you should not hang them up like other items because their weight will cause them to stretch. For those items, you should lay them flat to dry. Prepare a tablecloth or something similar, lay it flat, and then lay the sweater on top to dry, and after a while, flip it over. It takes a bit more effort, but for these types of clothes, if you want them to last, you have to put in the effort. This is also the reason why I buy very few clothes. The fewer clothes I have, the fewer steps I need to take to care for and maintain each different item. My wardrobe only needs a few simple, durable, beautiful clothes that are easy to mix and match, easy to maintain, and definitely easy to clean up whenever I tidy up the house; for me, that is the best.
Tip 5. Replace all the chemicals you usually use for laundry
In the past, I was just like you, buying laundry detergent and fabric softener from the supermarket to do laundry, why not, right? Everyone does laundry like that. However, gradually I became more conscious of health and read more about the common laundry powders and fabric softeners that I usually buy at the supermarket. And I read the ingredient list on the packaging, and I was really scared, so I started looking for alternative solutions. Now I have replaced both industrial laundry detergent and fabric softener, and I see many benefits. Every time I take clothes out of the washing machine after washing and hang them up, I no longer feel a sore nose and headache from inhaling the chemical smell. If you have been inhaling it for decades, you might not notice it; you might even find it fragrant. However, if you stop using chemical laundry powder and fabric softener for a while and then go back to inhaling it, you will immediately notice the difference. These laundry chemicals, no matter how much they try to advertise that they have floral scents, sunshine scents, and are safe for children, cannot change the fact that they still contain many harmful chemicals for you and your family. Not to mention they poison the water supply.
I hope you enjoyed this article and gained more experience in doing laundry correctly to ensure the health of you and your family.