Tactical Error: Laundry
My mood this morning, in spite of outside sunshine, was pretty grim. I decided to embark upon laundry. Not in the spirit of “perhaps this good, hard work will make me feel better” but rather “if I’m going to be in a bad mood then I might as well have several loads of clean laundry to show for it.”
Over the years, I’ve tried to simplify my life. This included simplifying my wardrobe. This meant getting rid of almost all dry-clean-only items, and keeping those that could reasonably survive in a delicates bag in the washing machine. So into today’s last and largest load of darks went a black chenille maternity sweater labelled “dry clean only”.
I thought I’d washed it before. I thought it was safe.
I brazenly didn’t put it in the delicates bag. Now everything in that load (including the neutral, not-so-dark stuff) is coated in wads of black chenille fuzz. I shook about 2 handfuls out of the offending sweater, and the laundry room floor is dotted with black. Additionally, I’d just taken a load of whites out of the dryer, and some black fuzz got onto that as well. I was able to pick most of it out.
I set the fuzz-generating sweater aside, though I might as well throw it away. It was a very nice sweater, and I regret that I won’t be able to wear it again. Most of my other maternity things aren’t as nice as it was. I have split the rest of that laundry load in half, putting each half through a rinse and spin again to see if I can get more of the fuzz off before merging both halves in the dryer.
My mood has not improved.
January 12th, 2006 at 11:21 am
I had my own Tactical Error with Chenille when Lissa was born.
My Grandmother sent us a box of baby stuff including a very nice Chenille baby blanket that we LOVED. Well being that I was not the most fashion/clothing savvy I just tossed the blanket in with her other baby clothes and washed on gentle without checking the tag.
It was a NET when it came out of the washer and there were wads of pink fuzz on EVERYTHING. I was crushed. I showed my husband and he was all “how could you not check the tag!” etc. I called and told my grandmother and she actually apologized, said she didn’t check the tag either since she just figured it was a baby blanket and you SHOULD be able to wash a baby blanket normally considering what could get on a baby blanket.
January 12th, 2006 at 12:15 pm
Chenille is the enemy, isn’t it?
January 13th, 2006 at 11:19 pm
Chenille is evil, only more difficult to spell. Mine was purple. And it looked so damn washable, I didn’t check the label either. Only pure evil can lull one into such a huge laundry debaucle.