Kelsey is joined by her cousin Abbey Elliott as we discuss a big thing most everyone sucks at: LAUNDRY. Yes, the dreaded laundry. We discuss the magic of black leggings, laundry with kids or spouses, and the smell that comes from wet laundry that needs to be dried. Time for a rewash!
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You can also connect with @StoryShout on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. Kelsey is @wonderwall7 on Twitter.
Kelsey is joined by her cousin Abbey Elliott as we discuss a big thing most everyone sucks at: LAUNDRY. Yes, the dreaded laundry. We discuss the magic of black leggings, laundry with kids or spouses, and the smell that comes from wet laundry that needs to be dried. Time for a rewash!
To learn more about StoryShout podcast advertising opportunities and guest openings, visit us at StoryShout.co
And don’t forget to leave us a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.
You can also connect with @StoryShout on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. Kelsey is @wonderwall7 on Twitter.
You're listening to the story shout podcast hosted by Kelsey Jones. We're a weekly podcast dedicated to destigmatizing failure and laughing at our normalcy. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. Hi, everyone. Welcome to Story shout. My name is Kelsey Jones and I am joined here today by Abby Elliot. Abby is actually my cousin. So I forced her to come on. Abby, thanks for joining me, of course. So Abby, what do you suck at that we're gonna talk about today, Kelsey, I suck at things. But what I've mainly suck at is laundry. Avoid doing laundry at all costs. Yeah, and I know, we've talked about this before. And I was excited when you mentioned that because I suck at laundry too. So I'm excited to dive into this. Yes, I think that laundry suckage is a common a common shortfall amongst humans. So probably have a lot of kindred spirits on this podcast. I think so. Now I will. I'm just gonna get it out there. I think like two months ago, I actually started paying a service to do my laundry. That's how bad I was. It's like $100 and they come pick it up every two weeks and then drop it off the next day, because I just can't. I just can't with laundry mountain anymore. Listen, is there a better $100 You could spend? I know. I know. And it's just my clothes. So we do our sons. And you know, my husband does his. So that's manageable. But mine I have so many clothes. It's just like overwhelming. Oh, I go a month with. Right. So how many clothes I have? That's a problem. Do you think that makes it worse? Do you think that makes the laundry worse having too many clothes? I really do. So my husband he is he's a freak. And he has he has like five pairs of work jeans. So they through Friday. He has his jeans. And then he every weekend, he does a load of whites and he does a lot of colors. And he folds them and he puts them away. And then he has his his five pairs of jeans are all clean and ready to go on Monday morning. And you know, I have approximately 257 pairs of black leggings and unlimited, so I don't have to do laundry every every weekend like he does. Maybe that's the problem. It's like we're not desperate enough. We had too many options so we can get lazy. Yeah, maybe I should only have like, you know, 10 pairs of underwear. You know, in case I put my pants three days a week. Like I know I always pack like twice as much as I need like that mean it's like, well, I'm going to ship myself every day this trip so bad. After vacation laundry. That's the worst. Or worse luck. No, there's not. Because you're already mad. You're back from your trip. You're like have a hangover from it. And then you have this dumbass laundry? Yeah, like I'm in Kansas instead of Cancun, right? And crab. Yeah, yeah. Angry laundry. I basically do laundry when I fit any more laundry in my baskets. And it's a disaster. I will say I'm good about sorting laundry. I have a hamper with three seconds in it. And I do black colors and whites. But it can hold two and a half weeks worth of clothes. So like just yesterday, I was like, can't fit any more clothes in my hamper. I'm just going to take all these black clothes and shove them in my washing machine. But as a washing machine, it's pretty much brand new. And the guy was like, this washing machine is huge. You can put 27 towels in it. And let me tell you I have already washed these clothes twice. Yeah, because first of all, I didn't trust that they were going to get fully cleaned because it was so full. just shoving them in there. Not washing a single a single speck of dog hair off of any of these leggings. It's just a disaster. So maybe the problem isn't you I think it's like maybe your washer and dryers the issue it's the whole institution Well, I'm you know, I'm going to tell you something else. So before I did the laundry service, I didn't separate anything. Now I would separate towels, but like blacks colors, anything goes. I'm just like you know if it serves If that survives if it doesn't, it doesn't like I'm not going to separate out, like jeans and shirts. I'm just not. Yeah, well, my is it's a pet peeve of mine when something like so like your light blue shirt. Like if that started looking really dingy to me, it would be, I would throw it away. It's a pet peeve. Like what's supposed to be white clothes look really dingy. So I have decided that it's worth it to separate. But honestly, that's why I'm with my dishwasher. If something says dish or hand wash only. I'm like, this is your this is your initiation. This is it. It's a do or die and it's right now. If you come out the dishwasher look at all mangled. That's not my fault. Maybe that's a whole other episode. It's like eating bad dishes because I'm like, fill time with like, so the dry clean only I haven't been to a dry cleaner. Like 10 years. So any like wet shirt or like sweaters I have or pants or dryclean only. I get those like at home dry cleaner kits and it's like these wet sheets and you put it in with the in the dryer. And that supposedly dry cleans it? I don't know, does but I'm not going to a dry cleaner. No. Oh, no. Well, I only wear vMix leggings. So I've never seen a dry clean only legging. That's true. You probably don't even know where a dry cleaner is. They also have only vide My God, we're not going to lose them. Okay, hell no. Hell no, my are way too sharp. She puts holes in everything. So that's just not going to happen. No special care items allowed in Le Yeah, and people are like, oh, you know, the Lulu lemons are the best. They last so long. I've had mine for 10 years. I'm like, Nope, I don't care about that. I'm gonna rough and sure a whole wave in there. You're gonna ride him hard and put them away? What aren't you? They're like, Oh, Lululemon is free repair. I ain't going in. I'm not going into Lululemon. i It's better not to go there once I'm not going twice. And then you have to go back and pick them up. That's three times it's too many times. My time worth. That's an important discussion. How much is my time worth? Right? For the $130 that a pair of Lululemon leggings cost? I can get on my app on Amazon. And I can get 15 pairs of leggings. And they can come to my door. Right? If they don't survive the harsh realities of my life. I play without any problem. Yeah, you don't have any regrets at all. Yeah. Over no records over here. Okay. That is bad with leggings is the chopper up. So I have like similar issues with the leggings. Yeah, and I would hate that if it was like expensive leggings. And I got like the it PILT Yes, yeah. I've bought one pair of Lululemon leggings in my life. And it wasn't a good experience. Yeah, I think especially if you're not like super tiny. It's even worse. They don't stay up or my over my love handles so they don't roll in. Yeah, forced. So, okay, so in your household. I know. You said your husband does his laundry. Do you do your kids laundry? Or do you guys split that? So I combined laundry with my laundry. Yeah. So yeah, that it makes it a little worse. Because I'm adding in 257 pairs of tiny little out items, right? With my items, which is just mentally I'm like, Holy fuck, can I class? Sure. I'm like, fuck, this is going to take me 45 minutes to fool. Okay. And then I have to get I had to get all these tiny items upstairs. Dropped the top part of the pile three times on my way up, right? A trail of socks. And it's just none of it's a good experience. So I'm going to tell you, we don't fold. Lincoln's clothes. We just stuffed them in dense so we have like shirts, pants, long sleeve and the next size up or something. I haven't. I can't I can't. I can't fold a little tiny shirt. It's not gonna look good. It's gonna Got unfolded. So why am I kidding myself? I actually was thinking this is pretty brilliant. But so the only thing we fold with LEDs is pants. And that's because, like, sometimes it's just harder to tell which pants is which. But I hang the rest of them. That makes it a lot easier. Yeah, but it's still, it's just, I don't I don't like it. If there was a laundry service in northern Kansas, I would use it. It was a dog pickups, a dog poop pickup service. I would use that. Yeah, we have that. You gotta draw the line somewhere. Yeah, I'll do my laundry. But last, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Your happiness. Yeah. But there's a giant us load laundry. And I wash it twice. And I got it actually moved to the dryer last night. So I did it on medium heat for an hour and a half. This morning, I'm thinking about this laundry. I'm thinking about this damn podcast. Got to shave myself. And I'm thinking I'm going to, I'm going to do it. I'm just gonna do it. You know? And I go, and it's still half wet. Oh, and, like, hour and a half miles will add 20 hours because I get myself pumped up enough to focus on folding this right? Have you ever folded laundry with a toddler around? No. Avoid it? I'm like, Get your ass out of this room. Right? Go. Coco melon. For 45 minutes. Yeah. Because I'm not going to fold everything twice. Yeah. What I used to do is it good. So like I do the laundry. But then we put it on a spare guest bed, which we called laundry mountain. And that bitch would get so high it'd be as tall as you. And so then I finally would get the energy to fold it all it takes me two or three hours to fold. And while I'd watch a movie or something firms or Bernie? Yes, it's exhausting. Like my back's hurting because of gaming for so long. I know. I agree. And I but then I see glimpses. You know, I'm sure everybody's like this where you see glimpses of the person you could be. So like, while I for maybe like a month or two years ago, I was doing I made myself do a load of laundry every week. Even if it wasn't full. I made myself and then I made myself fold it the same day it was done. But slow. I slowly, you know, slipped into my old habits. But as for a brief while I lived free on encumbered by laundry. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's, it's truly a transcended way of life. This is how some self actualized people do their laundry. Kelsey. Yeah. Is this what? Like? Who I don't know who has their life together? I would assume any celebrity has somebody doing their laundry. But like, yeah, you know, the girl in high school that always looked perfect. And now she still looks perfect on Instagram. You're like, is this? I bet this is what she does. Yeah, I actually remember you say celebrities, newlyweds with Samsung and Nicholas che for oh my god, this is so long ago. Like, what? 18 years ago, probably I was in high school. She was doing laundry. And she so like their rooms were on the second floor. And they have this like foyer and apparently their laundry room was like on the main floor. And she was just throwing all this laundry over the balcony to lay it like in their foyer. And it was like, four months worth of laundry. Oh, so much laundry. And I remember looking at that and be like, Girl, I do that to God. Yeah. If you were really rich. Yeah. If I was in, you know, wool, and I mean, now she has like a live for whatever. A full time housekeeper that probably does it. Yeah. Like I've been bad at laundry for so long. I remember like so in high school when I was a true leader. I would look at we would have a schedule of like games who's cheering and what uniform you're supposed to wear. And so I would like look at the schedule. Be like Okay, so this outfit I don't have to wear for like two weeks. I'm just gonna go ahead and put it in my hamper. And then what happens two weeks rolls around. I wake up late for school. I have to wear my cheerleading uniform. And I have to dig out this uniform that's been in the hamper for two weeks. For breathe it. Like that's wrinkle release or spray. Put that vich on and go to school. Okay, well, when you didn't like childcare, maybe remember I'm in so my mom started making us do our laundry. I think I was in like fourth or fifth grade. And I was bad at it even then, but there were so many times when I wanted to wear a specific pair of jeans, and they weren't dry. So I put them on I'd wear some like damp jeans to school because I was so add jeans. We've all done i Do you know gross like wet damp. Such a humid situation. It's humid like day. Oh God are like you don't rales you have to put on some half let brah I'm like cringing thinking about that. Well, and then you talking about your uniform. So Harry plays intramural basketball. And they have their one game shirt. And they have games once a week. And they have to wear their shirt. And so there's so many times he's had to go like with a damp shirt. Or for breathe it. I feel like for breeze is just like I mean, you're if you did for breathe and the wrinkle release, or it's clean at that point, right? Yeah. Like it basically was watched. And it's not like I was like sweating in it. But like Harry shirt, like the sweat. Like, yeah, that's really bad. That's why he always washes it. I don't think he ever is worn it dirty. I think he you know, wash it and have it be like, half wet. Then try your braids on it. Yeah, but it's been like 45 minutes before a game he needs to leave in 20. And he put it in the dryer like, yeah, and I told him, I said, Now why don't you just get multiple of the shirt? Can you do that? But that's destructive thinking, because I shouldn't do that. But that's like where my brain goes. I'm thinking let's just get 10 of that shirt. Yeah. That's a quarter. Right? But a fiscal quarter. That's a good for me. I want to do laundry every three months. Oh, well. And that's another thing I tried. So I told you I tried making myself do one load a week. Another thing I tried is just to embrace the hatred. And I purposely only did laundry once a month. And I do like new would be hell. So I did. I did. I had at that point, I had to do like six loads. And these are all my clothes. This isn't even like our kids clothes, Harry's clothes. And I just embraced it. So this was pre kids. I would do like six loads at a time. It takes me all day between washing and drying. But I made myself do it in one day. It wasn't worth it. Because it was so awful. Yeah, that sounds awful. You said you wanted to do it once a quarter. So that would be that'd be your Latins. Healthy. I want to do it once a quarter. But I only want to have one week's worth of. Well, if you just for breezed your clothes, you wouldn't have to wash them as much. Maybe that's the solution. Right? We need like dry shampoo, but for laundry where it's like absorbing the dirt. Yeah. But you're just you're just spraying. It's just is there anything worse? Well, yeah. But in terms of household chores, okay. That's a good question, though. Like in terms of household chores? Would you rather like clean out all the toilets in your house? I don't remember how many bathrooms you have? Or do laundry? I would I would rather clean all three toilets been do laundry? I would I want to say laundry. But the toilets would be done in like 10 minutes. Yes. But the line you see that the toilets are clean, right? And then every go to the bathroom for like, a few days. It's like, oh my gosh, this is the cleanest toilet. Like, it's not going to be a gross experience anymore. You know what I mean? Like, there's just a feeling of your toilet being clean. That's like I would I would rather do dishes, because I do dishes and the mental load has a visual representation of the sink being clear. And, you know, because there's they're worse than like PIPA, my little dog. She'll go out in the backyard and roll around in something foul. And this happened one time she did this. And I'm like, oh my god, I have to give this dog a bath. And she needs a bath and my sink is full of dishes. So like what happens to have this dog barking on my back deck while I do the frickin dishes to the dog. Like I just rather Yeah, well, and that's the other thing like with dishes and toilets and laundry. It's never done. No. So if you do all your laundry that day, you're already going to be generating dirty laundry. Unless you're doing all your laundry naked, the next moment you put on clothes you already have started the cycle and dishes is like that, too. But it's like, that's the other thing is it doesn't end. It's just they're always just perpetual. Yeah. And you can't escape it. It's like adulting. But I also did it when I was little. I don't know. It just sucks. Yeah, yeah. I started doing my own laundry at a young age to like you. And I. So in our, in our house that I grew up in, I had like, my room that I lived in when I was little, which is like, right across from my parents room. And then when I got older, I moved into a room in the basement, like little more freedom, like a teen teen hangout joint, right? So literally, and my, my childhood bedroom was right next to the washer and dryer. So I literally would wash and dry my clothes. And then I would just dump them in my old bedroom. And like never, I never folded them. I had like a clothes room that like when family was coming to fit, you guys, except when needed to sleep in that room. My mom's like, walks in there for the first time in three months and is like Yeah, well, that's what Harry does is he just lives out of a laundry basket. So we have this like very nice, like chest of drawers. There's all these shelves for him. There's another dresser in another room. He has some drawers in. He won't. He's given up on that. So that's that journey for him is he will put the clothes away. He just lives out of his laundry basket. That's like by his side of the bed. He's just, he's just let that part go in his life that he's gonna put laundry away and he just lives out of his laundry basket. See, and I think putting the actual laundry, like from folding clothes on the bed to putting it away. That's the easiest part. No, I disagree. I think it's that part because that's the part that's like, Okay, this is done. This is dusted. We can move on with my life. All washing dry all day. The folding and putting away is the worst to me. Well, and then I told someone else about how we don't fold Lincoln's clothes. And they were like, Well, why don't you just not fold your clothes, and just like stuffed them in the drawers? They're like, only society's making you feel like you have to fold your clothes. And I'm like, okay, yes, but I feel like my clothes would get more wrinkly, like his clothes are so small that they don't get wrinkled, like a T shirt doesn't get wrinkled, but I feel like my T shirts get wrinkled. So I don't go down that path. Well, and I mean, honestly, you kind of expect as you're wrinkly. That's Thank you. For mothers in their 30s who are entrepreneur business owners who apparently have their shit together. We don't. Are this the standards that society has set for us? Kelsey, are there just wait, I? I agree. You know, maybe, maybe wrinkled shirts should be the norm for us. Like, like you said, we're working mothers. We're business owners. Why eat me look shitty? Why do I have to look like I'm well? I'm not. I'm really tired. God Oh, right. Okay, like, exactly. Well, and, you know, that makes me think of this one time I went into Walmart in this hideous outfit. I mean, now one good thing about winter is you don't have to wear a bra because you have your hoodie. So nobody knows what's under there. Nobody needs to know. So it was actuations. Right. And I literally remember walking into Walmart thinking, Well, I hope everyone there just like assumes I'm sick. Because I just looked so bad. That was my hope for the strangers at Walmart that they thought I was ill. I'd rather look ill. Yeah. Haven't we all been to Walmart looking a mess though. Like, if you look put together in Walmart, I'm gonna judge you more than if you look ill. Like if you're hacking up a lung in the pile, I'm like, oh, that checks out. Normal, high heels. Like you're going for a night out like strolling through the aisles. I don't trust you. Yeah, that's not fair. That's not right. Right. So, but that's a good point, though, that you bring up like I think standards for women. Like and this goes into our clothes as well. Like, we're expected to have like nice clothes all the time. And Harry told me a couple months ago, he's like, the older you get the baggy or your clothes get and I'm like, can I live? Like sorry, I don't want like a thong calling into my butthole? Like, can I live with like, exercise oversized clothes, but as women are supposed to, like wear form fitting clothes or like, look presentable all the time. Oh, man, you know, those will be fighting words to me. You know what I'd say to Derek like, Well, you got me pregnant. And then I had a baby ID that I breastfed your baby. And now I look like this. And you know, what makes me happy is loose clothes. Yeah, I'm sick of like tugging at clothes all the time, or whatever. And now, I just have given up and I think having a kid definitely affects that. But then also like, the pandemic too. Yeah, like just being at home all the time. Well, something that I read a thing that like, really successful people have like a uniform. And they've, like, simplified the amount of decisions that they have to make in their, like, daily life. Right. So I and I really, I vibe with that, because I really hated the stress of like, waking up and being like, oh my god, what am I going to wear today? Nothing. You know, obviously, nothing's clean. I call my favorite hamper for two weeks. So yeah, like I wear like leggings, and a V neck t shirt. Or like, like a loose sweater every day. Yeah. Is like I don't have the decisions anymore of like, what am I going to wear? I just opened up the leggings drawer, I grabbed the women's on top. But you know, you got you got to clean up eventually. And that's the downfall of the system. That's true. Because I think even if I always lean towards black, like I'll wear color sometimes. But I've so many pairs of black leggings. And even if all my entire wardrobe was black, I still would suck at laundry. I don't it makes the laundry part easier. But I agree with you like wearing similar things every day, at least like clears your brain of that. Yeah, it does. So I guess that's or people that ate laundry is just buy a bunch of this. So it doesn't matter if you're down to your last shirt and your last pair of pants. Because it's all the same as the day that they were all cleaned the first time for the first you know what I mean? Yeah. So then if you still didn't wash them, you can hide that you use for Breezer. Yeah. Fabric Refresher, whatever. Nobody knows. They're like, Oh, Abby just has another pair of her leggings on. They don't need to know that. It's like, yeah, than you were yesterday. That's something else. And I know, we're kind of at time. So this might be like a good closing question. Is, and this was kind of different than the closing question. I I told you I might ask, How often do you rewear clothes? So all rewear leggings, like twice, and I of course bras that could probably be its own episode, I'll rewear a bra like several times, but do you rewear before washing. I think it's much I wore them. Like if I if I were like, for a full day. I don't I would try not to worry wear them. But like there are times that I just put leggings on to like, I mean, let's be honest, if I'm home, I'm in my MooMoo my night gowns. Okay. So like there are times, like, every morning that I go to work, put on pants and I tuck my night shirt into the pants and put a coat over that and take Ellie to daycare. Wow. And her little her little teachers don't know that I still have my MooMoo on so like, you know my my daycare drop off pants I'll rewear a lot because I don't wear them that but like if I if it's a full day worth I try not to but I but I try not to I mean I'd probably do it twice a month. Still. Yeah, if I work out in clothes, I won't rewear but I'm like lounging I might rewear the black leggings again, and I usually always have t shirts and and like sweatshirts. Yeah. Oh, well. If I have a T shirt on under it, and I didn't drop any food on it. Oh, we wear a sweatshirt. Three times. Yeah, same but for me. I'm like a messy like tornado person. So I always have like random stuff on my sweatshirts. Yeah. And also the person that knows like, I'm a person that knows way too much about the human body obviously, like especially leggings and like tighter clothes. I'm like There's a lot of dead skin cells in those pants. And that that knowledge and that that it kind of makes me for a little bit. A lot a lot of dead skin cells your point? Well we think my rewiring strategy. Okay, well I'd like snake. Well Abby, thank you so much for joining me to talk about our most hated topic. Thank you Kelsey and I thank you for also sucking out laundry with me. Well to everyone listening thank you so much for joining us and don't forget to leave us a review on Apple and then Spotify started doing reviews too. So don't forget to leave us a review there as well. So thank you and until next time thank you for listening to the story shout podcast. Don't forget to review us on iTunes and connect with us on social media at story shout or online at story shout.co Until next time, stay normal