Sunny days are here again...get that laundry outside.

I covet my neighbor's clothes line. I know we are not supposed to covet anything, but I do and it is a clothes line. She has 3 lines and it has to be at least 15-20 ft long. It is in a sunny corner in her back yard and right up against my yard, so of course I have to watch her hang her sheets, towels and clothes ALL year long. I am so jealous.




Unfortunately we just don't have any sunny lawn space to give up for a clothing line. I do, however, have a sunny patio where I put two wooden racks from mid-March to mid-October depending on the weather. The only things that don't fit on the racks are our sheets. The larger rack on the right in the picture was given to me by my mother for Christmas one year...we are a twisted family. She hangs laundry year round and rarely uses her dryer. She knew I wanted to hang my laundry outdoors and found this at a farmer's market. It is huge and can hold quite a bit of laundry.

I hang about one load a day and in the summer when it is really hot I can hang two loads. It takes a little longer for clothes to dry on racks. I put the laundry in my dryer for about 10 minutes before hanging outside. I find that this helps soften the clothing, especially the towels. After the ten minutes I hang any clothing that gets hung on hangers, like my husband's dress shirts and pants, in my laundry room where we have a small clothing rack. I am able to do this all year and it saves a little bit of dryer time through out the winter.

The perks:
* I have not done any calculations, but I have noticed reduced electric bills when I don't run our dryer all of the time. It usually takes a good 45-50 minutes to dry a load of our laundry and now I use the dryer about 10 minutes a load.
* Drying outside also helps removes stains from clothing.
* A great chore for my three year old to get involved with and she usually likes to help.

Are you able to hang your laundry outside? Have you noticed a reduction in your utility bills?