Wash Day

Years ago, Mondays were the traditional laundry day. Now with automatic washers and dryers any day is laundry day. When I was a kid my Mom had a wringer washer. The process was time consuming and much of the day was spent watching the clothes gurgle in the wash water then sending the clothes through the wringer. If I remember right you had to be cautious of how the buttons went through the wringer.

After all the laundry was washed, rinsed and wrung out the clothes got hung outside on a clothesline if the weather was respectable. Once I was tall enough to reach the clothes line, I was enlisted to help because there were more loads of laundry that needed to be washed. Shake the wrinkles out then pin the clothes to the line. Each item had a proper way to be hung. Then you hoped for a good wind to dry thing faster and remove wrinkles.

Sunshine was good, too. When I had my own clothes lines they were used for diapers, cloth diapers, and the sun would help bleach them and the wind softened them. Bed sheets would often spin around the line before the day was over. Towels would snap in the wind. John hated when the towels would feel like boards after a day on the clothesline. Mostly though the clothes had a great fresh smell to them.

I remember when I was little and Mama would wash my quilt. I loved the smell of it when it came off the clothesline, and I would cuddle with it the rest of the day. Then, Tuesday was ironing day. How times have changed.

"She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come. She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue. She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness," (Proverbs 31:25-27 NIV).