To be fair, whether and when I fold my laundry is dependent on medical issues of fatigue and not that I don't think they SHOULD be or that I don't WANT to fold them immediately. Also my husband does not like to have his clothes folded, he throws them into an ungodly, horrifying pile on his side of the closet that I must avert my eyes from every time I go in there. So, that happens, too.

Oh, yeah, I absolutely didn't take it as a criticism of me, personally (I do all my own crit in-house, no need to outsource!) but it does sometimes drive me crazy that I have clothes sitting in our spare bedroom that are not folded and are not getting folded, because The Husband DEFINITELY cannot be trusted with even the folding of towels. Or the loading of the dishwasher. Or, really, cleaning of any type, as he tried to kill me with ammonia fumes the last time he tried.

I generally fold laundry within a few hours of it being dry. That's the best I can do, LOL. Also, I divide into piles by who the clothes belong to before folding (but then pretty much fold whatever's nearest to hand.) I do not fold underwear.

I had a friend tell her kids they had to be a certain age before they could load the dishwasher, and it had them clamouring to do it. Each child kept up the ruse of what a great job/honor it was until all four boys were of age, which I think was 7 or 8. Brilliant, no?

Folding laundry is ZEN. I hold to this. I fold it straight out of the dryer, and put it in piles on top of the washer as the new load is washing. When I'm done folding, I take the piles, bottoms on the bottom, tees and tops in the middle with undies and what not on top, and take them to the dresser.

My roommates in college LOVED when I did laundry. I was a few years older than they were, and they were still living like they were at home, with mommy to do for them. Invariably, their clothes would still be in the dryer on MY DAY!!!! (yes, this angered me, WE HAD A SCHEDULE DAMN IT!). And as I thought it rude to just pile their crap on top of the dryer, I folded their laundry while mine washed. Neat little piles of teeny tiny tee shirts and basketball shorts, camis and jeans...

I won't go into the messes in the kitchen....

In other words: ORDER in the laundry room! Yes, by jeeves. Fold the damned clothes!!!! *seethes*

I get the suspicion that you are facing with your family what I face with mine: I do the washing of the laundry, sorted by color and texture and soap needs; then I dry the laundry, some by air and some with the dryer; then I fold the laundry, using neat little stacks where the trousers and sweatpants are always at the bottom and the undies and socks are always at the top; then I distribute the laundry - giving each family member their respective stack and putting mine away; then I find about 7 minutes later that my family has taken their neat little stacks and somehow managed to create big messy piles which the cat and the dog are using as pillows.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

My husband was telling me last night that he wished I'd yell at him more...guess what I'll be shouting about sometime later this week?

Despite being in charge of laundry, I am a terrible folder of clothes. My husband even more so. I procrastinate heavily. But when I do fold I organize at the folding stage and make piles of 'like' clothes so that I can just quickly put everything away and be done with a drawer.

My husband does not organize his drawers and I never put his clothes away because invariably he will end up bemoaning how he lost such and such a shirt and I will point exactly where I put it and he will go "But I didn't think it'd be put -away-" So I've given up.

My cats just like to sleep on it and my 13 month old just likes to roll around on it and drag random pieces into the bathroom and drop them in the shower while I'm cleaning myself.

sort out the underwear, shove it in the drawer. "Fold" the socks, by which I mean pair them up hopefully correctly and shove them in the drawer. Fold the washcloths or the husband cries when he can't find any.

Shove the shorts in a drawer, hang the jeans. Sort out the tshirts and shove them back in the laundry basket and shove THAT in the closet. I'll fold those later. Probably.

Flip a coin, heads fold and put away towels, tails, shove them in a basket and back into the closet.

What?

Oh crap. I forgot I was doing laundry earlier.

I'm sort of ridiculously proud of my ability to fold fitted sheets correctly. There are so many household things my mother didn't know/care about/teach, and I wish I had a model for more of it! But thank goodness Martha Stewart taught me the easy way to fold fitted sheets so that my linen closet looks good (call me crazy, but I am a big fan of a nice looking linen closet).

What is WRONG with them, Laura? Geez.

and don't get me started on how my family loads the dishwasher...

In other news, school starts in less than three weeks and the Mr. is traveling more and I am pretty excited about the upcoming solitude!

Ah. A woman after my own heart. :-)

Edited at 2013-08-07 01:39 am (UTC)

You would walk into my house and punch me in the face. And it would be deserved, Laura. It would be deserved.

Some of my laundry gets folded and put away right off (mostly my work clothes). I make piles of mine, hubby's, son, daughter.

Some gets hung up still wet because they can't go in the dryer (hubby's cotton tees, some of my tees and all my work shirts). This is also when during the summer the clothesline out back comes in handy. Sadly my son is no longer allowed to hang things out there because he can't do it right.

The best thing I ever did was make everyone do their own laundry in this house. We usually all do loads on Saturday, and I help with folding if they want me to (they don't because they're still mad at me for making them do their own laundry). Yay!

In other news, I sort by whites, underwear and tshirts, jeans and hoodies, and delicates. My kids throw everything from bras to blouses to jeans together, which makes me cringe but again, they do it, so.

How the heck did your bday sleepover go?!?

As a singleton, I used my dryer as a second dresser. Especially if it's full of scrubs for work. Hit fluff, get makeup and hair done, pull warm scrubs from dryer, get dressed in laundry room, and then, out the door for work. I only iron if my mom is going to see me. *shrugs* :) but, I do love to laundry. Sort, treat, wash, etc.

Sometimes, I fold it right out of the dryer, other times, I let it pile up in the basket and ignore it. BECAUSE I CAN MUAHAHAHA!!!!

I'm fussy and ritualistic about laundry not only because it's a great opportunity to be fussy and ritualistic, but because there's real joy in washing and folding, and in bringing clean, fresh clothes out to wear that aren't covered in cat fur, and having beautifully organised shelves.

The Ex used to wash his clothes and basically store them in a heap in the basket.

I fold my smalls, just so they'll look nice in the drawer.