Long Live Your Laundry!

"Long live your laundry." Is that not the most awful thing anyone could ever say to you? Like I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy even though I am aware of the fact that laundry isn't going away anytime soon.

Have you seen some of my Tweets about my total lack of desire to do laundry? Of all the things I have to do at home, I think laundry is right up there with dishes. I'd rather clean the toilet, y'all! Such is my aversion to laundry. Now don't get me wrong, I love freshly laundered and super-clean clothes as much as the next mami. I would just prefer that someone else do that. So when Tap Influence rang on the bat phone and told me they wanted me to chat with you all about my laundry challenges, well, it was too good to pass up! But mainly because I misread the email and thought they were going to send someone to help me with the piles of clothes that needed washing.

Here are my top two problems with laundry:

1. I hate it and
2. I don't like it when my clothes look grimmy

The only thing I can think of that would remedy #1 is getting a housekeeper home manager that would gladly take this chore from my hands and insist on waving a wand in order to magically transport clothes to their appropriate slot. Seriously, it saddens me. I would post a picture but I feel you people judge me enough. Allow me the secret failure of knowing there's a pile of (CLEAN) laundry in a basket on the other side of the room. Or maybe I could add this to my list of things my awesome imaginary, non-existent, will I ever find you, Mr. Right will gladly take off my hands (along with the rest of the cleaning and the grocery shopping).

As I try to psych myself out to wash some clothes, I have some reminders that I thought you could use. These are some of my tips to you to ensure the laundry gets done:

1. Separate your clothes before taking them out to the laundry area (my area is the garage) - you totally need to do this because if you don't and then forget that the laundry is out there, you will have used your last pair of underwear and be searching for more (in your towel, while the kid is crying and the phone is ringing and someone just pinned a great recipe) before you realize that you ain't got no more clean panties. But, maybe that's just me. Keep the dirty laundry in visual proximity
2. When you take clothes out to the laundry area, make sure they are going into the washing machine - I don't like my garage. Perhaps if I had shelves and rows of stuff and a bike on the wall I'd spend time there. Or maybe if I had a "creative" station with all of the fabulous crafty things I pin. But I don't. Which means I end up with the situation described in #1 more often than not because I catch myself being productive and taking all my clothes out there only to totally forget about them
3. Set the alarm on your phone to go off every half hour after you think the laundry is done - this will prevent you from experiencing landriosis forgotetus. Do you know what this is? This happens when you leave clothes in the washer for too long and they get smelly and then you have to re-wash them because you really shouldn't dry them in that condition (trust me: I've done that and it's a rancid smell that you don't want on yourself or on your kids). If you ever smell someone while you're out or something but their clothes look clean, they are a victim of landriosis forgotetus.
4. Fold the laundry immediately after the dryer stops and buzzes to tell you the clothes are dry - This is a dream. I haven't done this since about 2003 so I can offer no tips on this. However, I'm taking advice so, comment below

On to challenge #2: lately, I've noticed that the frog princess's socks are all weird and discolored. She wears "school" shoes and they are basically Mary Jane's with the opening on top and so when I take her shoes off you can see a clear delineation almost as a taunt to remind me of how little control I have when she is not under my roof (I'm already not loving the teen years). She insists that it's "the mulch" but seriously, does she take her shoes off and walk in the mulch? I am contemplating strapping some sort of camera to her shins or something that will allow me to see the process in which her socks get so grimy! I don't get it.

So of course, I had to try this Tide Vivid White & Bright detergent.

And I have to say that I'm pleasantly surprised. Here's the thing, I got new socks for the girl and so this is a great way for me to keep them white as she astounds me with her ability to let the mulch overtake her at school. Check out the befores and afters:

I think the socks are a hit! Well, their total lack of griminess is. I am going to confess that it's been a while since I've used Tide but I'm kinda glad I did because I was beginning to wonder if I should just let my kid be the only one in school wearing long black socks with her school uniform.

Tide Vivid White + Bright keeps whites brighter longer allowing you to break the rules of white. Learn more about Tide’s whiteness regimen by visiting DailyCandy. 

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Tide. The opinions and text are all mine.