Laundry Days

The last two days have been  blustery with winds leftover from Hurricane Sandy finally making their way this far west.  Our temperatures have been in the mid-40's during the day which isn't too bad, but the wind somehow manages to find a way through all my layers of clothes no matter what I wear.

Since we had such an enthusiastic 20-30 mph breeze on hand, I decided to hang my laundry out on the wash lines on Monday.  Actually, I got the idea from my mother when I drove by her house on the way to exercise class and saw her sheets already flapping on the lines by 9 AM.   All the while I was hopping around at exercise class, I was thinking about the laundry.  My friend Nancy agreed with me; there's nothing like line-dried laundry.

Flapping in the breeze.

I got home by 11:30 and had the laundry out by 1PM.  Steam was rising from the laundry basket and every wet hunk of clothing as I hung them up; it was a bit cool out.   Mid-afternoon was too late in the day to have the wash dry completely this time of the year, but with no rain in sight, it dried beautifully by Tuesday.   I love my solar dryer.  (I don't have any other kind.)

And neither does my mother.

Mom and I both still use wringer washers.

In case you don't know what a wringer washer looks like, in the photo below is my wringer:

Ain't she a beaut?

Never leave the wringer's rubber rollers together when not in use.  The rubber will stick together and the rollers will be damaged. 

 I know you will all want to take notes on the proper usage of wringer washers.  I'm here to help, grab some paper and a pen, this won't take long. 

There she is, my circa 1950's Maytag.  I'm circa 1958, so we have a lot in common.

The Elusive Lucille has always owned Speed Queen washers.  Hers is also circa 1950-something.  Mom is circa 1920, so to her, this is a rather new machine.

Oh, what's that?  You're not interested in learning to wash clothes in one of these?  You don't want to run your fingers (or other 'parts', tee hee) through the wringer?  Don't worry, your fingers will learn right quick to steer clear of the rollers.  And once you wrap a bath towel around both the top and bottom rollers at the same time, you'll be SO proud of your cussing skills and new-found upper body strength when it comes time to pry them out.  Oh, I forgot.... you get to master the stairs, too, because you have to hoist all that wet laundry up the steps and out to the wash lines.   It's a workout, folks. 

   I can hear you now; 'Why don't you buy your 92 year old mother a nice, new machine?  Or, better yet, do her laundry for her??'

Because.

 If you knew my mother, you'd know why.  She wouldn't hear of it, that's why.  She has nothing but the utmost disdain for automatic washing machines.  To her, they are wasteful of water, laundry detergent and time.  And the same goes for dryers, too.  We both still hang our laundry in the basement during the winter. 

And she insists on doing her own laundry, thank you very much.  When I tell her I can help her wash clothes, she gets an attitude.   Yes, even 92 year-old ladies can tell you to 'talk to the hand'....it's not just a teen-age thing. 

Mom won't listen to talk about new-fangled machines.

Mom says doing the laundry keeps her young.  She has a system for taking the baskets up the steps by placing the basket one step up at a time until she's at the top.

How long will she be able to handle all this work?  I don't know.  But I do know this:

I'm blessed.

Mom and Pudding.