There are lots of Facebook groups based around line-drying washing, both indoors and out. Some of the comments are very strange and I wonder why it seems so extreme and 'old-fashioned' to some people, to me it's just the way it's always been done. Why pay for electricity to dry your clothes, bedding and towels, stripping fibres from them in every drying session ... I have no idea, but it's not for me, never has been and never will be.
I grew up with the sort of scene in the top photo, lines strung across the kitchen, which was also our living room. I was used to watching Blue Peter, or Watch with Mother sat on the floor to one side of a sheet so that I could see the television.
When I married it was a similar scenario, although I didn't have a washing machine and everything started off on an airer stood on the sides of the bath until the things had stopped dripping. Oh, how I envied my Mum the mangle she had had for years that took all the excess water out of the clothes and left them just non-drippy enough to be able to be strung across the kitchen straight away.
I got my first little table top washing machine when my second son was a few months old, when hand washing nappies and school uniforms as well as all the bedding etc for four people while living in a small flat proved too much. Washing the bedding and larger towels still had to be done in the bath but virtually everything else could be washed, rinsed and then gently spun before being hung out on a line that was outside of the bathroom window of our third floor flat.
Now my life seems so easy in comparison, and when I got my first automatic washing machine when we moved from the flat to our council house I said thanks at every load it did for me ... I still do.
It's that time of year now, when I can just about leave the washing to be done until the sun is shining or the wind is blowing, before loading the machine and letting it do all the work. I love pegging things out, I don't like bringing them in quite as much, I don't know why unpegging and folding annoys me so much but it does.
Yes, I'm odd but at least I know it. 😄
I left the small amount of washing on the line while we went out yesterday, the skies were a perfect shade of blue, there was a lovely, if slightly chilly breeze and it was nearly dry as we left. But I went out without bringing it in. Fatal mistake!!
It obviously rained while we were away and when I got back it was hanging slightly damp but back in the sunshine, so I left it. Half an hour later the heavens opened again so I dashed out and brought it in, draping it all on the airer to finish it's second drying. Now the washing is on the airer in the bedroom and the sun is shining outside.
Oh the perils of line drying.
Nothing's perfect, but then nothing has to be. 😃
Sue xx
There isn't much more satisfying to me than seeing a line of laundry blowing in the breeze. Xx
ReplyDeleteIt is satisfying isn't it. I used to be the most satisfied seeing a line of a dozen terry nappies blowing in the sunshine. :-)
DeleteIn my first flat I had a tiny top loading machine but it didn't drain & had to be emptied by hand inyo the kutcgen sink. I did the wash, then took it all to the bathroom and rinsed in the bath, then carried it to the spindryer outside the bedroom to spin, then pegged it to an airer on the balcony (we couldn't use the drying yard 2 flights down, because people kept nicking the washing) Sometimes I'd have 3 washloads on the go at once. I was running from one room to another like a demented squirrel, trying to manage all the laundry.
ReplyDeleteIn the flat where we live, there is no outside drying area, and we are not allowed to dry washing indoors. The kitchen is far too small to have a tumble dryer. The laundrette is two bus rides away. I'm lucky, I have a dehumidifier so I ignore the rules and dry my washing overnight with the dehumidifier running for a couple of hours.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was little I used to hate the way the washing tickled the top of my head when it was strung across the kitchen and now I still couldn't cope with a head massage!
ReplyDeleteI remember we were given a twin tub as a wedding gift and I felt the luckiest girl in the world. When the babes came along, I could boil the nappies and took great pride in their whiteness on the line. I smile now but it gave me pleasure.
ReplyDeleteNow I dry on the line when I can and have a drying rack to put up when the weather doesn't play ball. Tumble drying is just so expensive! xx
We peg out when its fine, thats the one thing my husband was so pleased about buying here, there was a long washing line!
ReplyDeleteI'm with you! I love hanging things out but hate bringing them in. Like you I'm not sure why. Perhaps less Zen?!
ReplyDeleteWe bought a dryer when the children were small. I only just it when I had too. But drying outside is my favorite choice. The smell... but also the sun makes white even wither. Two years ago I sold my old dryer. We didn't use it anymore. Do I miss it? Not really. Just on the days it seems nothing will dry. But no time passes by I get more and more used to it.
ReplyDeleteI love bringing the dry wash in. Folding and iaring I dont made. I just love all the need piles of need laundry.
The towels are in the machine and will go out shortly as it’s cold but sunny here today. Catriona
ReplyDeleteYou can't beat the smell of freshly line dried washing but I'm also with you on loving the pegging out but hating the fetching in! I don't enjoy ironing either but feel the need for neatly ironed clothes and bedlinen. The sun was shining beautifully when I pegged the washing out yesterday morning but it went very grey by 1pm and, as we were going out, I fetched it in and placed it on the airer in front of the patio doors. I'm glad I did because it drizzled later in the day.
ReplyDeleteWhat memories that you have brought back. Like you we never had a washing machine but I did have a spin dryer which my mum bought after 5 years of being wed, when the children were born. All the washing was done in the bath. I have no need for a tumble dryer as my washing is dried outside or on the maiden.
ReplyDeleteI love the smell of outside dried washing, especially if it has been a cold but sunny day. I have been lucky because my husband has always worked shifts so I could leave washing out and he could fetch it in if need be. More recently my son has worked from home so he would hang out and/or fetch in if necessary. I now have a spare bedroom (eldest moved out) so I have a finishing off drying rack in there.
ReplyDeleteJane (a regular reader)