My goodness how times have changed. When I was growing up my family had a laundry line that went from the house out across the backyard and hooked up at the end of the yard onto a very tall poll. My mom would do the laundry in the washing machine that was downstairs in the basement and then she’d haul it up the stairs in the laundry basket. Mom would keep a bucket of wood clothes pegs in a container by the back door that she would take out onto the porch with her and the laundry basket and hang the clothes out on the clothes line to dry. It was a “given” that in the nice weather, of which we have just had some very hot weather, all the laundry would be dried outside on the line. That was what families did back then, every one had a laundry line. Friends would come over to play and mom would have had everything, and I mean everything, hanging in the breeze. As I sit here at my computer and remember, I can recall several times being embarrassed because the whole families “unmentionables” were blowing in the breeze for all to see. Sure, lets hang out clothes and linens outside, but I would get so upset when my mom would hang my underwear up so the neighbors could peek at them and know what my unmentionables looked like. I can laugh about it now but back then it wasn’t funny.
Times changed, and certain neighborhoods got the idea in their head that laundry lines didn’t work with the “look” of the neighborhood. Hanging your clothes out to dry only happened in the poorer areas of town or in the pictures of the slums on television….or that’s the idea that was at times portrayed.
I guess the saying what was old becomes new again can also be true of laundry lines can’t it. There have been many challenges to this idea that hanging laundry looks bad as most of us, including municipal governments and Hydro companies are encouraging, are “into” saving money. As recent as April of 2008 the premier of Ontairo, Dalton Mcguinty stated that dryers use 6% of Ontario’s power supply and decided to lift the ban on outdoor clotheslines. Amazing huh, an entire province of people were actually banned from using clotheslines! Thank goodness that changed…money talks doesn’t it. So now hanging your clothes out to dry has become almost “trendy”, or “hip”. What, trendy you say? Yup…in fact if you look at what your options are now for drying your clothing without a dryer you may be surprised! Some would say infact, we are behind Europe not only with our fashions but also when it comes to cleaning and drying those fashions.
Let’s have a look at the different options available to us to hang up our laundry.
#1 The old stand by laundry line is still available, where one end attaches to the house and the other to a large pole/post at the other end. If you visit the website of the hardware store Rona, they have a very good post on how to install a clothesline post. Click on the “pointers” box and then the “greenwise choices” box to find the post.
#2 The umbrella line. This is the laundry line that has a pole down the middle and the top folds out like an inverted umbrella although there appears to be many options to the old inverted standby.
#3 The small round hanging line with attached pegs. This has been popular in the past with the grandma’s who lived in apartments and washed their stockings and underwear in the sink and then hanged them up in the tub over the shower head with this line. The price point on these are fabulous as I’ve seen them for sale for well under $10.00 in several different stores.
Remember those three options? They are kind of the standard. Well…there are many more ways to hang your clothes, the following are just a few.
#1 The Antonius. This is a clothes hanger sold by Ikea that looks a bit like a bakers rack that you hang from a ceiling with pulley’s. You would lower the rack down, hang up your clothes, and then pull it back up to dry them. This would be a great option for inside a garage, a laundry room, or outside on a patio if it was covered.
#2 Metal Folding Clothes Dryer. This is a dryer that I myself purchased from Real Canadian Superstore. I only have a postage stamp sized backyard so this one was a great option for me. Another reason I like this dryer is because it isn’t wood and therefore I don’t get any staining on my clothes that can happen with the wood ones. I also like it as it folds up for easy storage. I slip mine between the wall and the washing machine…isn’t that great! I think I paid about $30.00.
#3 The Barbantia Wallfix Dryer. This is a dryer that you must fix to a wall and pull it out like a shelf when needed. It will give you about 25m of line. The nice option to this dryer is that you can push it back against the wall when not needed. At the time of my research the dryer sold for about $170.00.
#4 The Three Tier Tower Dryer. This is a metal drying rack that includes three shelves for laying out sweaters etc. and a bar at the top to hang clothes on hangers to dry. The neat idea they had to add to this one is that it is on castors, and the price is right, around $35.00 from Canadian Tire. The down side is that it won’t do a full load by any means but it would work for a single person, or maybe a couple.
#5 The Sundog Balcony Dryer. This is a great idea for the condo or apartment dweller as the rack fits over the balcony and comes out like a shelf. This dryer retails for about $28.00 from The Sundog Clothesline Company.
http://www.sundogclotheslines.com/index.html
Look at the photos, aren’t they tall? I am quite amazed at how much faster they have sprouted than the tomatoes and onions that I planted at the same time.
I’m kind of hoping that this warm, yellow ball in the sky they call “sunshine” will come back again!
We went to the gentlemans house that sells rain barrels and after I had chosen the colour he made a hole in the top of the barrel to catch the rain along with some mesh to keep out the bugs and any critters. He also added a brass tap to the bottom. The tap was fitted turned to the side to make it easier to put a bucket or watering can underneath…great idea huh?
