Laundry Battle

We seem to have an ongoing laundry battle in this house and I'm not sure that it will ever go away. If Drew and I didn't have this to fight about, I'm not sure we would have anything to take it's place and at that point life wouldn't be fun anymore now would it? The bottom line is that there are 2 people in this house who both assist with the laundry, but neither one likes to do it ALL. Drew will wash and dry the clothes, but hates folding and putting away. I'm not big on the washing and drying (I often forget the clothes once they go into the washer), but I don't mind folding.........and I can deal with putting away. I'm sure you're going to say, 'Well why doesn't Drew do the washing and drying and you do the folding and putting away?'. Sounds simple, right? WRONG! Because you also have 2 people in this house who like to do things when it's convenient for them. Drew might get the washing and drying done, but then the clothes will sit in a wrinkled mess until I can get to them...which in turn means we either have to wash half of them again or actually get out the iron. I opt for rewashing because who uses an iron anymore? At that point the clothes go back into the washer...and then are forgotten about by me. Now granted, since I put them in the washer, I should also probably put them through the dryer...HOWEVER, I have made it very clear that my memory is not the best these days. Drew knows that I am a space cadet so why is it that I'm still held accountable? Are the crazies at the mental ward forced to clean up their own pee when they accidentally piss their pants? I don't think so! Besides, technically...it's all Drew's fault anyway for proceeding with the washing and drying, knowing that I won't get to it for awhile. The whole process is a vicious cycle of craziness.

Then we have our ongoing argument about how things are put away. I KNOW that I can be a little too anal about our closets and dressers. Casual shirts for Drew are hung facing the right on white hangers, dress shirts and polos face the left on white hangers. Casual shirts for me are hung facing the left on white hangers and dress shirts face right on black hangers. All other clothes are organized by type...underwear, socks, pjs, jeans, etc. Everything in Lili's dresser is organized by outfit with just a few things by type...everything in Will's dresser is by type, all pants in one drawer all shirts in another. Many years ago I would get super frustrated if clothes were not put back into the 'system' the way they should be. This is why I almost always put clothes away. Since we had kids though, I think I have gotten a little better and my standards are lower.......which is absolutely necessary when you have a male doing laundry. I used to want everything folded a certain way, now I don't care...as long as it looks decently straight. I used to care about the direction something was hung and the color of the hanger...now I just want it hung. I don't care about how. I even understand that Drew is not the best judge when it comes to what makes an 'outfit' for Lili, so I don't expect him to do that either. I do expect that if he wants clothes put away on his timeline, that he at least give it a half-assed effort. I tell him to pretend he is the shirt or the pants or whatever it is that he's putting away and to ask himself, 'If I were Andrea's PJ pants, where would I go?'............and his answer should be, with the other PJ pants! 'If I were Will's jeans, where would I go?'...answer: 'In Will's pants drawer!'. Even if clothes are a little more sloppily (is that a word?) folded than how I would have done them...and even if they aren't placed in a neat little stack in a drawer...as long as they make it to where they SHOULD BE, which isn't hard, I'm great with that! It's when things get thrown into empty spaces, just to get them out of the laundry basket that frustrates the hell out of me.

Take for example this past weekend. I was in Ohio. Drew was home with the kids and wanted the laundry done. He took it upon himself to put everything away and I truly APPRECIATE that...but then I see what I was hoping not to see.......socks in underwear drawers...underwear in sock drawers...shirts in pants drawers...towels literally SHOVED into the linen cabinet so that they were a big heaping mess and had to be refolded. It was just a little...ummm...crazy. I tried to ignore the towels, but when I saw them, I absolutely could not let the image go from my mind...I had to refold them. And all of the missplaced items were put back into their designated spots. If our system were complicated, I could give Drew the benefit of the doubt, but seriously? I KNOW he knows where this stuff goes! And what is even funnier about the whole situation is that there will come a morning when he goes to get clothes for Will at 5:30am and he won't find any pants for him. That's when he will ask me where all of his pants are (with a very irritated tone to his voice because it's in the wee hours of the morning) and I will have to tell him to check the shirt drawer and he will be frustrated with me for telling him to look in a place that should not have pants......hmmm... My solution to this is to just leave everything in laundry baskets until I can get to them. Why? Because at least then our system won't get screwed up and we all know that Drew putting them away doesn't make anything better.

I'm kind of glad Drew doesn't have a blog...though I wonder what his perspective would be on this laundry battle if he had to put it into words. Despite his hastiness in putting clothes away, I do love my husband and I know he does way more than a lot of husbands do when it comes to this house! It's just too bad that he's color blind...and a little challenged in finding like items...I wonder if he could be trained............nope, doubt it! HA!