I grew up doing laundry by hand. When we got home from school we would change into our play clothes and, like all the neighbors, my mother soon had our school blouses and gym clothes on the washing line for tomorrow. If the day was damp, they’d be finished in front of the fire or in the “airing cupboard” (or “press” in Ireland) the cupboard or small room that houses the water heater, tightly surrounded by shelves and hooks for drying off clothes and linens and storing them until time to iron or use them. Clothes thus dried have a crisp warmth that we welcomed on winter mornings, and cotton sheets keep their line-dried smell.
For more than one or two items, we had an appliance that heated and agitated water but had to drain into the sink via a hose. Laundry was fed through an attached wringer (mangle) between each rinse to get the soap out and at the end to help it dry. Laundry was a labor intensive activity, and once everything was washed it all had to go onto the line outside or onto the banister and folding clothes drier if it rained. I still get a huge sense of satisfaction from seeing a line full of laundry, but thankfully there is a lot less labor involved.
When I went to university I saved my allowance and worked in a bar and my grandfather used his General Electric employee discount to help me buy a real plumbed in washing machine with a spinner for my newly divorced mum. And here I am in rural France four decades later with two very fancy washing machines, one “full size” (aka “American size,” and the same brand as the one we have in the US — it even sings the same song when it finishes the load). We still have to dry everything on the washing line or in front of the fire, but that means the sheets still have the smell that no chemicals can create!
These images are all from “the guests-just-left laundry day,” but two different days. The “main” picture is from a sunny August day and includes various blue and marigold sheets, quilt covers, and towels from the attic beds. The others are from today and feature purple sheets and towels from the downstairs studio (“The Lavender Room”) and olive brown/green for the upstairs (“Olive Room”). As there are eleven different sized mattresses (and therefore sheets) in France, my strategy is to color code rather than go from room to room, and house to house, searching for the right sized sheets as we have always done in the other houses (hilarious though that often is). Here, the purple sheets fit the beds in the Lavender room, etc. And the towels and bath mats match too because, why not?
And this simple color coding makes the end of laundry day a pleasure!
Sheet sizes
Honestly. Eleven. Below is a guide from a bedding company. Apparently the addition of 200cm, which increased the list from six to eleven, was thanks to IKEA. But, whatever the reason, it is impossible to get a snug fit with 200cm sheets on a 190cm mattress, or any fit the other way around. In the old houses, with older beds, the sizes labeled here as “small double,” “double” and “queen” are the problem. The mattresses all fit whatever frame they are on, but when you try to make the bed up, 20cm is the difference between “it fits” and “I give up” or “where are the flat sheets?” Eight of the attic beds in our house are either “small single” or “single,” so I just got single sheets for all of them and tuck in the difference at the foot of the shorter beds. That works. Don’t get me started on square, oblong, or bolster pillows…
