Doing Laundry?

[Pooh'sBuddy]

Happy New Year :wave: and Go Horns!!! BTHOOSU.

Seriously, how many people do laundry while on their trip? :shrug:

We're packing for cold and warm weather, and I suspect our suitcases will be full. On one hand, we want to spend as much time in the parks. But, if we can lighten our load of clothes to bring and do a couple of loads at the same time, I think that would be beneficial.

But, will we really have the time to do it? I don't want to plan on laundry time and then not do it, and then be in a pickle.

Do y'all have strong feelings either way?

Jennifer

 

[sweetpee_1993]

I'm in the minority on this one I guess. I don't do laundry on vacation. I do enough of it when I'm home. That's just me, though. Yes, I have a lot to do when I get home, but I deal with it. Laundry robs me of my Disney magic.

I wish I didn't have to do laundry while on vacation. 4 of our 6 family trips plus the trip hubby and I took this past May were all 10 day adventures. I don't have 10 pairs of shorts or 10 pairs of jeans so laundry is part of the price I pay for a long trip. Also, we generally have a couple sets of coordinating family shirts that we can use more than once on a trip if I wash them up. More bang for the buck there. WHen I was a kid I was a middle child in a big blended family and absolutely hated that unless our clothes were visibly dirty or so stinky that it was noticable we had to wear stuff multiple times between washings. Lemme tell ya, I have this **thing** about washing clothes now. If something has touched me it gets washed. I generally only wear my pj's once and then wash 'em. Weird, huh??? I get told that a lot and I probably do wear out clothes faster than a lot of people because I wash them so much. It's just one of those things...and everybody has their "thing". LOL! Hey! One thing that IS pretty cool about washing clothes in a laundromat vs. the single pair of machines at home is that you can do 3 or 4 loads all at the same time instead of cycling thru your loads throughout the day. And the hubby helps me at the laundry room so that makes it better, too, and gives us some quiet time to just chatter with each other. :wave:

 

[erstwo]

We made a trip to Target and got the Tide packets and made it by the toy section, too. We picked up "Cars" colored light swirly things for the boys to have at night - $3.99@ - a far cry for what they'd charge us in the parks.

Well, yay!

Have a wonderful trip!!

 

[CLandrum]

I wish I didn't have to do laundry while on vacation. 4 of our 6 family trips plus the trip hubby and I took this past May were all 10 day adventures. I don't have 10 pairs of shorts or 10 pairs of jeans so laundry is part of the price I pay for a long trip. Also, we generally have a couple sets of coordinating family shirts that we can use more than once on a trip if I wash them up. More bang for the buck there. WHen I was a kid I was a middle child in a big blended family and absolutely hated that unless our clothes were visibly dirty or so stinky that it was noticable we had to wear stuff multiple times between washings. Lemme tell ya, I have this **thing** about washing clothes now. If something has touched me it gets washed. I generally only wear my pj's once and then wash 'em. Weird, huh??? I get told that a lot and I probably do wear out clothes faster than a lot of people because I wash them so much. It's just one of those things...and everybody has their "thing". LOL! Hey! One thing that IS pretty cool about washing clothes in a laundromat vs. the single pair of machines at home is that you can do 3 or 4 loads all at the same time instead of cycling thru your loads throughout the day. And the hubby helps me at the laundry room so that makes it better, too, and gives us some quiet time to just chatter with each other. :wave:

Don't feel weird. I am the exact same way I even wash jackets after I wear them once and my coats get washed at least once a week. If I can't wash it I don't buy it. No "Dry Clean Only" clothes are allowed at my house.

 

[happymom52003]

Lemme tell ya, I have this **thing** about washing clothes now. If something has touched me it gets washed. I generally only wear my pj's once and then wash 'em. Weird, huh???

I don't think it is weird because I am the same way!

I actually enjoy doing laundry.:lookaroun

I love the smell of clothes right out of the dryer, and I love folding and sorting them while I watch T.V. It is relaxing to me.

I'm such an organizer....maybe that is why I like it. I also enjoy loading the dishwasher. Unloading it is another story....but I don't mind loading it.

Okay, I'm begining to think I'm the weird one here!:ROFLOL:

 

[Rob562]

I'm in the minority on this one I guess. I don't do laundry on vacation. I do enough of it when I'm home. That's just me, though. Yes, I have a lot to do when I get home, but I deal with it. Laundry robs me of my Disney magic.

On most of my trips I don't do any laundry either.

Normally I'm going in early December when the weather is cooler and T-shirts, jeans and a sweatshirt are fine. And I have a very large suitcase, so I'm fine with that as checked luggage and a carry-on backpack.

But the most recent trip was early September. It was VERY hot, and even though I'd packed extras, I went through T-shirts a lot faster than I'd planned. (That, plus one night at PI I had a "Kungaloosh Accident", and I needed to wash the shirt and shorts)
So one afternoon while my friends went off to do the Kennedy Space Center tour (which I'd done a few years before), I popped in a load or two of laundry and took it easy until they were done.

I think someone already mentioned it, but I bought a travel-size bottle of Tide at Target (though I haven't seen it for sale there lately). It has 4 loads of soap in it, and when it's gone it's easily refilled.

My one gripe about the laundry rooms in general (because I think they're all generally the same) is a lack of a sink to rinse things in. I had to go into the bathroom next door.

-Rob

 

[happymom52003]

I'm just curious....for those of you who say you do not do laundry on trips, do you have kids with you on the trips?

Before we had kids, we never did laundry on our trips. We had no need to, because we could easily fit a week's worth of clothes in our suitcase.

But after having kids, we just do not have the room to pack that much stuff. In additon to their clothes, there is alot of other stuff you have to take with you when you have kids. I just do not see how I could pack a week's worth of clothes for everyone without having waaaaay too many suitcases!

 

[cattle]

Can't you just leave your clothes in the provided dry cleaning bag every day? Then they would be dropped off clean for you the next day. I think that is how the resort dry cleaning service works.

If you do the dry cleaning, you won't have to waste vacation time and money doing laundry.

 

[dizzney]

We are DVC members and always stay in at least a 1 bedroom so we have the washer dryer, and pack clothes for three days

With 5 of us, I wash a load every day (bringing powder from home or having delviered with Garden Grocer) we have those pop up hampers so dirty goes in there. In the DVC villas, its so easy to pop the load in when you leave and throw in the dryer when you rturn, nothing hard about it at all.

Then when we leave, I use the dry cleaing bag to put any dirty stuff in which ends up by my washing mahine when we unpacl This way we get a vacation at home too by not hacing to wash vacation clothes.

This past August whne we visited Disneyland and stayed on points at the Grand Californian, we washed while at the pool, my husband and I timed the washed so we could run up and move it, did it once there in the four nights and it was easy,

I'd rather we all had clean clothes by washing than deal with extra luggage, and with kids, you know there is always the incident of the spilled ice cream / soda or whatever that you need cleaned so it doesnt stain or smell!

:wave:

 

[Disneykidder]

Of all the times I have been to WDW, I have only done laundry once...on my most recent trip. We were there for 9 days so we only packed enough clothes for 1/2 the trip and did laundry one night while hanging out in the pool. It wasn't bad at all. With the prices of taking luggage along, this was better than overpacking or even taking an extra suitcase.

I went to Walmart and got two small bottles. I filled them with my fav. detergent from home. The bottles cost me less than $1 each. One was enough for one load and we did 2 so it was perfect.

Tip: Either do the bottle thing like I did, or buy your own fav. detergents before you go. The people who were doing laundry when we were hated the powdered packets they sold and it left gooey marks on their clothes and it was very pricey.

 

[sweetpee_1993]

Can't you just leave your clothes in the provided dry cleaning bag every day? Then they would be dropped off clean for you the next day. I think that is how the resort dry cleaning service works.

If you do the dry cleaning, you won't have to waste vacation time and money doing laundry.

Well, technically, you could leave your dirty laundry in the dry cleaning bag(s) and they'd return to you clean. The problem is they charge by the piece. Who wants to pay $3 for a sock or a pair of drawers??? I did the math once on how much it would cost me to have 1 day of clothes done at $2/piece. I have 4 people in my family. If each person wears jeans, tshirt, underwear, and socks that's 5 items per person (not to mention that I wear cammies under just about everything these days). Then there's pajamas. For my family we produce probably 8 pieces of laundry per night. That means altogether we would produce 28 items total each day. At $2/piece (but I'm quite sure it would be more at WDW) that's $56/day. Our trips are 9 nights so multiply that out and we're up to $504 for someone else to do my wash for the entire trip. That doesn't include washing of sweatshirts, etc. Even tho my boys are 11 & 12 years old it still works out for us to take a mid-day breather from the parks. We tend to hold up better into the evenings this way. When we do our laundry we let the boys run to the arcade or swim or something while hubby and I run a quick load. Sometimes we all lay down for a nap and we set an alarm on a cell phone for one of us to get up and run to switch the clothes. Aaaand, if one of the kids has had a particularly nasty attitude for the day (which doesn't happen much but HAS happened before) they get stuck with the task of helping with the laundry.

I really do wish there was a wash/dry/fold service at WDW! That would be a dream for me! If anyone ever finds one that delivers to WDW property let me know. I've looked/searched/called and never found a company that offered this service.

 

[Phonedave]

Another person who does laundry here. With or without the kids.

I just like comming back home, opening the suitcase, and putting it away. Not having to stare at an overloaded hamper when I get back is great.

Washer and dryers in 1BR DVC was one of the selling points that helped make me a member.

-dave

 

[wvdisneyfamily]

I wish I didn't have to do laundry while on vacation. 4 of our 6 family trips plus the trip hubby and I took this past May were all 10 day adventures. I don't have 10 pairs of shorts or 10 pairs of jeans so laundry is part of the price I pay for a long trip. Also, we generally have a couple sets of coordinating family shirts that we can use more than once on a trip if I wash them up. More bang for the buck there. WHen I was a kid I was a middle child in a big blended family and absolutely hated that unless our clothes were visibly dirty or so stinky that it was noticable we had to wear stuff multiple times between washings. Lemme tell ya, I have this **thing** about washing clothes now. If something has touched me it gets washed. I generally only wear my pj's once and then wash 'em. Weird, huh??? I get told that a lot and I probably do wear out clothes faster than a lot of people because I wash them so much. It's just one of those things...and everybody has their "thing". LOL! Hey! One thing that IS pretty cool about washing clothes in a laundromat vs. the single pair of machines at home is that you can do 3 or 4 loads all at the same time instead of cycling thru your loads throughout the day. And the hubby helps me at the laundry room so that makes it better, too, and gives us some quiet time to just chatter with each other. :wave:

We typically go to WDW for about two weeks in June. Our clothes do get sweaty and are not reworn. I pack one set of clothes for each day (including socks and undergarments) per person plus about five extra outfits, several extra pairs of socks, extra undergarments, and extra shorts to wear with shirts bought on the trip. Since it is summer, we pack t-shirts and shorts. Those do not take up much space. Our luggage is typically two duffle bags, two suitcases, a garment bag, and a laundry bag that holds our extra pairs of shoes. We do not fly so we don't have to worry about baggage limits.

I do take stain treaters with me and treat stains in the bathroom sink of our room as needed.

 

[lbrad]

I do laundry on any/all vacations. Family of five makes for mounds of dirty clothes if I wait till I get home. Love the convenience of being able to do several loads at once...it is done in no time

 

[bigorangeandy]

For trips of more than a weekend we do laundry. One thing I do is to bring a laundry basket with us (we drive), as we always have lose items that need to go up to the room. Once we get in the room, the basket goes back to its original intent. I also bring soap from home, I just use an empty water bottle and measure and mark the soap into the bottle.

 

[marcriss]

We pack for half the trip and do laundry half way through. I agree about traveling with kids, we have so much stuff just packing for 1/2 the trip. I don't see how we could avoid it.

We brought draw string laundry bags with us this time so we could sort hot and cold as we used things. We put all the dirty stuff in one suitcase when we leave and it's pre-sorted when we get home.

If Target doesn't have the detergent try Bed & Bath. In NY, B&B now has Harmon Kardon drugstores in them. They have the best travel/trial selection I've ever seen.

As far as the laundry service goes, 2 years ago we were having a particularly bad stay at the Beach Club. One of the things they did to fix the situation was take care of our laundry. It would have cost us between $300 & $400 if we'd had to pay for it. It was a little weird getting your socks and underwear in boxes and they looked liked they'd been pressed. As everyone else already said, it's a perfect pool time chore...or rainy day chore.

 

[Pooh'sBuddy]

I'm in the minority on this one I guess. I don't do laundry on vacation. I do enough of it when I'm home. That's just me, though. Yes, I have a lot to do when I get home, but I deal with it. Laundry robs me of my Disney magic.

I agree. I don't want laundry time to rob us, but the boys will need some down time anyway.

WHen I was a kid I was a middle child in a big blended family and absolutely hated that unless our clothes were visibly dirty or so stinky that it was noticable we had to wear stuff multiple times between washings. Lemme tell ya, I have this **thing** about washing clothes now. If something has touched me it gets washed. I generally only wear my pj's once and then wash 'em. Weird, huh??? I get told that a lot and I probably do wear out clothes faster than a lot of people because I wash them so much. It's just one of those things...and everybody has their "thing". LOL! Hey! One thing that IS pretty cool about washing clothes in a laundromat vs. the single pair of machines at home is that you can do 3 or 4 loads all at the same time instead of cycling thru your loads throughout the day. And the hubby helps me at the laundry room so that makes it better, too, and gives us some quiet time to just chatter with each other. :wave:

I usually can wear sweats/jeans two times before I need to wash them, but I can see where you're coming from. I agree about the doing multiple loads at one time. That will be a time saver, especially since I'm expecting to have to do two drying cycles.

Well, yay!

Have a wonderful trip!!

Thanks!! We just got a few pre-trip e-mails from Elizabeth-Kingdom Konsultant which makes it all the more real.

On most of my trips I don't do any laundry either.
Normally I'm going in early December when the weather is cooler and T-shirts, jeans and a sweatshirt are fine. And I have a very large suitcase, so I'm fine with that as checked luggage and a carry-on backpack.

But the most recent trip was early September. It was VERY hot, and even though I'd packed extras, I went through T-shirts a lot faster than I'd planned. (That, plus one night at PI I had a "Kungaloosh Accident", and I needed to wash the shirt and shorts)
So one afternoon while my friends went off to do the Kennedy Space Center tour (which I'd done a few years before), I popped in a load or two of laundry and took it easy until they were done.

I think someone already mentioned it, but I bought a travel-size bottle of Tide at Target (though I haven't seen it for sale there lately). It has 4 loads of soap in it, and when it's gone it's easily refilled.

-Rob

With it being January, we're packing to layer our clothes, hence the concern of having enough room in the suitcases. That's a good point of going in the summer - lighter clothes but you may need to change outfits each day. With the kids, I don't think we'll be having "Kungaloosh Accidents." Those days are over. The travel size bottles sound more cost effective, but I've not seen any lately either. We also got the individual Downy packets.

We typically go to WDW for about two weeks in June. Our clothes do get sweaty and are not reworn. I pack one set of clothes for each day (including socks and undergarments) per person plus about five extra outfits, several extra pairs of socks, extra undergarments, and extra shorts to wear with shirts bought on the trip. Since it is summer, we pack t-shirts and shorts. Those do not take up much space..

I do take stain treaters with me and treat stains in the bathroom sink of our room as needed.

Thanks!! Got the Tide to go - I've read that they work. I could live in t-shirts and shorts, but going in January - to me, anything under 70 degrees warrants covering skin.