Posts
photo © 2007 Renee | more info (via: Wylio)My dear husband took our little one to the grocery store. The boys were at church. I was, blissfully, home alone... with piles of laundry. Some people love to do the laundry. Seriously, it's their favorite chore. Some people can't stand it. Those dirty clothes seem to reproduce in the basket and the job never ends.
I'm somewhere in between, I guess. I don't love laundry. I mean, really, stinky teenage socks? ICK! I don't hate it either. As the piles of clean clothes stack up, folded and fresh, I can see my accomplishment. Laundry is laundry.
Until yesterday.
I loaded the bathroom towels into the washer and had a little room left. I trotted upstairs to check bathrooms for any towels that might have been left behind. In the kids' bathroom, three washclothes lined up side by side on the towel bar. They looked cute. I know -- washclothes aren't cute.
But they were.
As I pulled them off the bar, I broke out in a huge grin. It suddenly hit me. No one will ever know that I took a couple extra minutes to get those washcloths. They won't notice when the linen closet is restocked with clean towels. They'd notice if we ran out, though. In that moment, my heart changed. I suddenly realized that laundry is a labor of humble love.
8 comments:
"Thank you, Lord, for giving me a family, a home, and laundry to do. Thank you for a beautiful laundry room and bathrooms full of wet towels. Help me to work at my tasks as if doing them for you!"
Loved the post! Sincerely, you are what I hope to be. I am not quite to the humble loving laundry phase. I will strive to have this attitude. Hopefully my piles of laundry don't swallow me up before I get there. :) Janae
Janae,
I certainly wouldn't say that I've arrived! I just happened to have one laundry day with the right attitude. I am and always will be a work in progress. :)
Love,
Karen
If you're not already doing it, have the kids sort the laundry as they take off their dirties ... by having a white and a colored basket in the laundry area. And remember - this is my soapbox - hehe - kids need to learn how to do their OWN laundry!
too true.
unless of course you send hubby to bring down everything that needs to be washed. i sort and put things in and measure the washing cream, etc. he brings the baskets and everything i ask for.
we share.
he likes me to be finished as much as i do.
and there are many labours of love that will never be known about. my daughter will probably never realised that once we started making ponytails for her, i had to get up a full 15 minutes earlier in the morning just to get everything done on time, and my husband will probably never realise that i painstakingly organise the kitchen so that he can find everything where he thinks it should be.
but i love doing those little things. for me, as much as for them.
Barb,
The kids do much of the laundry. I happened to be home alone -- loving that phrase, home alone -- and wanted to get ahead. A collective gasp goes up among readerdom... AHEAD on laundry!!! Amazing :)
Seriously. I don't normally wash kids' clothes that aren't turned right side out, uncuffed, buttoned and zipped, and sorted.
Sometimes it's nice to surprise them a bit.
I love doing laundry for my family...I don't iron as much as I used to but I LOVE freshly laundered, folded with love clothes. Now vacuuming I can't say that about! ;)
Okay, Patti, true confession time.... ready for this?
I vacuum and do lunge/squats at the same time. I don't like either, but when I do them together, I feel accomplished!!! Just call me a multi-tasking mama! :)
Post a Comment