~Written and edited by Veronica Clark ~

Monday 25 June 2012

Wash Day Blues....

Hello everyone!!!

How was your weekend? Ours was wet and very cold. The kind where, the front of the fireplace is the only place you want to be with a throw, snoring dogs at your feet, a good red wine and a lovely pile of magazines and a good book!


Now its Monday morn and....

..well, I stumbled out of bed and poured myself a cup of ambition and viewed the bulging laundry basket with a look of utter dismay!! I swear it was empty on Friday!! Not even a lost sock in sight...and I was home alone all weekend and wore the same outfit twice???




I love these apothecary jars! Mine are all safely ensconced on my formal dining table and I am not sure that they are going to do duty in the laundry room just yet!



Let me explain.... I share the basket with a dance student, aka my son, Byron. He has perfected the fine art of "layering" for the cold wet winter's mornings of The Mother City. Please, let  me emphatically,  empathise that word "layering", hence, the pregnant laundry basket...sigh...a long layered sigh!!  And again.....s...i...g...h...





Glamorous chandelier for the laundry room and I have to say that the aqua colour of the walls would definitely have a calming affect for a labouring laundry maid!

His morning ritual ( can't really call it anything else than a ritual) of dressing for class is as follows .... first, his dance/jazz  pants with a sleeveless vest, followed by a tight long sleeve "under top" ( just until he is warmed up in class...), followed by an over top or two, depending on the frostiness of his bedroom chambers. Finally it is topped off with a hoodie, for... if it rains and then a jacket against the wind, you understand? Feet...ditto!
Thin ballet socks followed by thin actual socks, followed by thick woollen socks... I am surprised that he fits them, his socked up feet, into his shoes at all!!! All this for the walk from the car park to the dance studio...




Another glamorous chandelier for the laundry room! Have I missed a trend or what? Note to self... investigate laundry in new house to see if a chandelier might be an option....as chief laundry maid, I  defiantly need some eye candy in there to deter sighing and the odd screech... will fill you in , in due time....


 Oh yes, did I mention that it is winter here and that our winters are wet wet wet... and getting the laundry dry, without using the tumble drier and the entire supply of Eskom Electricity is a fine art in management that needs far more publicity than it currently enjoys. Sigh....electric one this time....




Serious electric consumption going on in here but glam all the same...check those jars out. Maybe mine should move from the dining table to the laundry...


Getting things dry is, well a stroke of luck really...  Time to top up my cup of ambition afore I tackle it, the pregnant basket, and wrestle it into submission...




This one might work for me...

I bet few laundries actually look as civilised as these do on laundry day....




What a great sorting system... one which will fail outright in my house with the dance student. Well, when he disrobes his layered self  at bath time from his sweaty layers he somehow manages to do it in one movement...yip all them layers lands, if I am lucky, into the laundry basket as if it one solid garment. Emphasis on solid!!

Enters the laundry maid circa 2012....fuelled up by two cups of coffee and on caffeine high ....



...what follows now is not for printing...but some choice words gets uttered whilst I try to disentangle the multiple layers!!!  This is not an exercise you wanna attempt when in a rush... you just quickly wanted to throw the laundry into the machine in passing out the door to do your shopping....no sirree this is a gym workout of approximately an hour, preferably done alone ( to spare anyone the words that fly randomly from your lips) whilst you yourself start to disrobe from the heat generated in your entangled wrestle.

The dog runs for cover. If the student was home on a Monday morn, well, I might be writing this from my cell and if the neighbour caught a glimpse of me in this instant I might I might be writing it from an asylum!!




Now, this might just be the answer....a sophisticated room where no choice language is allowed and a chair on which to perch, the calming sounds of Vivaldi's four seasons rings out while I sit and gently disentangle my dearest beloved sons dance ensemble while humming along!!!




...and when I'm done I will still be in the mood to arrange a vase or two...




Love this space and the colours




The red denotes my laundry mood!!!




A round of applause please!!! All the layers have been disentangled, I am still a free women, the student is alive and  was last seen roaming on the beachfront and it is not raining, it just looks rather bleak outside and the kettle is on of a top up on the ambition!






Live Well

Veronica

xxx

All laundry rants and screeches may be left in the comment box below, choice language...well...optional...and all sympathetic comments will get preference...

Images from Pinterest

12 comments:

  1. These wash rooms are fabulous!!! Laundry is my worst chore, might as well have a beautiful space to do it!
    xo
    Sharon

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  3. Dearest Fellow Laundry Assistant,
    How I empathise with you two of my sons were in the Armed Forces and I have done my fair share of sweaty wet soggy tangled unmentionables in my time. Even the odd surprise has crawled out on the one occasion a black widow spider secreted it self in a black polo neck top whilst on operations in a never spoken of place and only noticed as it was being placed in the said washing machine. After the immediate shock said eight legged monster was gingerly removed out the back door still clinging to its temporary home on the end of the broom. Whereupon it was stamped on by a size 11 Army boot.
    My current laundry room is an outside shed just beyond the back door under cover so I can get to it in inclement weather. Our next big indoor project is for me to have a laundry room in the house just off the kitchen. Now let me see Chandelier V Strip Light Ummmmm!!! No contest.

    Yours Laundry Lady.

    Before I part company for today word of advice ditch the ambition for a red wine. By the end of the laundry who cares about lost socks. It works for me! 

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  4. Hi darling, it's hard to believe we have temps close to 100 and you're dealing with cold and rain. I could not get enough of the beautiful laundry rooms you shared. I have a wonderful laundry room love it, however; after viewing these I can so see a chandy hanging and lighting things up.. that's a quest for another day..
    hugs ~lynne~

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  5. Thanks for the laugh and the laundry inspiration! I'd take any one of those rooms. I have a fairly decent laundry room off the kitchen, but it could use some decorating, and perhaps a chandelier! I love the apothecary jars but I don't think they'd survive long in a room with a stone floor. I can just see me catching one with an elbow as i fold sheets.....and speaking of sheets....has anyone, anywhere got an easy tutorial for folding fitted sheets?!

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  6. Vernoicca I am so laughing! I'm sorry but my husband did the same dang thing when taking off layers it all comes off as one left for me to yank apart but I think I have it fixed. If the items to be washed aren't pulled apart they don't get washed period! I'm not sure a pretty light fixture would make the laundry business any better but it would be prettier.

    Happy Monday!
    XX
    Debra~

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  7. Ha ha , well told and beautifully shared! And to think the laundry basket is pregnant every week...for ever!!
    Colette xx

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  8. I utter the same expletives a few times every week while scrubbing 4 pairs of extremely muddy rugby shorts. (Surely only a man would have decided playing rugby in white shorts was a good idea!) Anyway, I think if I was doing the scrubbing in any of these gorgeous rooms, it would help my mood a lot! x Sharon

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  9. Sorry it is so wet there! But these are lovely images to cheer you up!
    Stacy

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  11. i would dream of having a laundry room like any one of these! very inspiring and oh so beautiful, each image that you posted! i would love to fill the apothecary jars with lovely imported soaps from France, have bouquets of lavender, rose and lavender scented water for ironing with...and then of course the house to go with the laundry room!!

    thanks for making a chore seem like a fun activity!!

    Anna Sadler

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  12. With laundry areas that are as gorgeous, who doesn't want to do laundry? Loving those red washer and dryer too. Enjoy the fabulous start of the week, Kellie xx

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