<p>LasMa, You keep crazy hours. Don’t they go to bed early in Sacratomato?:)</p>
<p>Schmaltz…I’m a little too old to wear my t shirts and jeans “skin tight”. I try to get these items out of the dryer quickly so they do NOT have to be ironed…but sometimes life gets in the way…and they do end up wrinkled…so I iron them.</p>
<p>DH irons his dress shirts himself…everyday. He would not have it any other way…and he irons a crease into his slacks too (the ones that don’t need to be drycleaned).</p>
<p>I don’t iron…I’m so bad at it that the clothes look worse than if I just don’t bother. If you lay your clothes out when you take them from the dryer – instead of just tossing them in a basket – they don’t get wrinkly.</p>
<p>Masslou, does the washcloth help ‘steam’ the clothing? (#17) What a great tip. </p>
<p>My girlfriend swears she gave up ironing for lent ten years ago and hasn’t picked up her iron since!</p>
<p>The way I see it, refusing to iron limits your clothing choices.</p>
<p>I already limit my clothing choices by going out of my way to not buy anything that requires dry cleaning for routine business or casual wear. (I work in a business casual office, so this is not as hard as it sounds.) I don’t want to have to pay ransom to the dry cleaner to get my clothes back after every wearing. If I further limited my choices to things that don’t require ironing, I would have a very limited wardrobe.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>OMG, Oldfort, I must say when I read the OP, I actually thought of you and said “I’ll bet Oldfort likes things ironed”. And the reason being is I’m so extreme in the non-iron camp… and you and I are always on opposite ends of such matters! </p>
<p>Isn’t it funny (or sad!) one can spend so much time on a forum that one can actually come to know people even though they have never met? </p>
<p>I can’t appreciate one’s appreciation for ironed sheets or underwear, but I do like that if one is outsourcing that task, it is a great way to spread the wealth. And if one is actually doing their own ironing, I’m in AWE that you have this time.</p>
<p>A related question: Who folds their underwear before putting in a drawer?</p>
<p>Hanging up dampish clothes, then misting them and stretching out the wrinkles works for me. Not quite as crisp as using an iron, but IMHO works better for knits and other 100% cotton items. I have pants stretchers (mail ordered), but never use them for jeans.</p>
<p>It is funny how you get to know people on a forum. To give myself credit (or not), when I used to do my own ironing, I would do it Sun night while watching TV. My kids knew to bring all of their clothes to be ironed into our room before Sun night.</p>
<p>My shirts are hung in my closet by color, and my shoes are organized by color too.</p>
<p>I don’t iron a thing. I can’t imagine spending the time to iron sheets! And I don’t have anything that I take the dry cleaners either. As long as I take every thing out of the dryer asap and snap shake it and either hang or fold it neatly, it looks fine. </p>
<p>But I do fold my underwear :)</p>
<p>True story: it is a source of family amusement that I refuse to iron; FIL thinks it’s funny, and was rolling when the only thing that broke during one of our moves was the iron. Anyway, the kids were little and we joined a new church. When approached about joining a committee, one suggested was Altar Guild which sounded fine. I went to my training only to find that the biggest responsibility was laundering and ironing all the linens used during the services (and there was a 16 page book explaining the correct ironing procedure for each type of linen.) I was flabbergasted! I couldn’t exactly say “are you sh*&^ng me?” So I decided that I’d be ironing for God and that there must be some reason I was supposed to be doing that. Did that for 9 years, with DH laughing his butt off every time I trudged to the laundry room. Did not mention that experience at the church we joined after we moved…</p>
<p>fold my underwear
don’t iron sheets ( although I have in the past)</p>
<p>I was too young to see the danger signals of the first time I met my boyfriend’s mother. ( now MIL) she was ironing- not boxer shorts- but * jockey* shorts!
I never even tried to keep up with that level of fussiness.
Tablecloths I iron- perhaps is why I don’t use them often.
Iron something maybe a few times a year- generally a cotton shirt or dress.</p>
<p>I thought only cowboys wore ironed jeans.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Ha, we have something in common! I do this too! But it’s entirely for the sake of efficiency (as easy to hang back with like colors than not, and then easier later to find what to wear). If it’s about efficiency, I’m all over it.</p>
<p>I’m really not wrinkly either, though I imagine that is a matter of judgment. I try to buy clothes with non-ironing in mind. And I do own a steamer for occasional use. It helps tremendously to live in a very informal region, and also to work in a job where on most days I can wear absolutely anything or just work from home (though I keep a suit on the back of my office door for unexpected meetings that might require it). </p>
<p>Why do people fold their underwear?</p>
<p>Regarding ironed sheets . I dont actually iron them myself. I wash them - dry them in the dryer and send them for press only to the laundry. I hang my pillow cases to air dry, spray them with a scented linen spray, roll them and place them in the freezer until I am ready to do my ironing. Like Oldfort I iron while Im watching TV shows I have DVRd.</p>
<p>Crazy I know but growing up we were extremely poor and rarely got new clothes. My mother insisted our 2nd hand clothes be clean and pressed.</p>
<p>^ I love your explanation. I think a lot of things we do are either because we grew up doing it, or we are set to do the opposite. In the house I grew up in, big and dysfunctional family living in a very small and run down house, I don’t recall ever eating at a table together, or even having matching dishes. You ate as you went, often in front of the TV if it was called ‘dinner’. Anyways, this background I think is why I feel strongly that we always eat dinner together as a family, and why I always like setting the table in a really nice way (which maybe others see as not a good use of time either). </p>
<p>Who has a steam dryer and do you find it useful?</p>
<p>Back in the 80’s I was in the Navy and 2 other officers and I went to Australia for a few weeks of vacation. One guy was a slick-dressing ladies’ man from Philly…the kind of guy who always had a no-wrinkles “Saturday Night Fever” look. This was a period in which a lot of young people in Europe and Australia wore very big, intentionally wrinkled clothes. After about 2 weeks of being rebuffed by every Aussie girl he approached, he growled “They want wrinkles? I’ll give’em wrinkles !” He then reached to the bottom of his duffel bag and pulled out a collarless shirt with a few buttons on it (a style familiar to anybody who remembers the '60s). It was old, faded, stained with bleach, and completely wrinkled. He wore it that night and spent the next few days and nights with a beautiful and classy blond.</p>
<p>I posted earlier and am an ironer. I know a lot of people who do not own an iron. They usually look acceptable. I have always been curious. How does one have cotton wrinkle-free (mostly) clothes? Especially if they are hung on a clothes rack to dry? I have even tried drying them and pulling them straight from the dryer and they still have wrinkles. Do all the wrinkle-free people use softener? Due to allergies, I can’t. Maybe that’s my problem.</p>
<p>I do think hanging to dry makes good t-shirts and printed t-shirts last much longer and stay better looking. Like the above poster, my mother was dirt poor and insisted on clean and ironed clothes. she always said being poor was no excuse to be dirty; soap was cheap.</p>
<p>^I’m not sure now that you ask. I use a dryer and a dryer softener (btw one that is scent free if that helps with the allergies), and they come out fine (or so I hope they do but again maybe my idea of non-wrinkled is not someone else’s). </p>
<p>I also just avoid buying fabrics that are wrinkle prone. I find high quality seems to work better too. So for example I find my super-thin cotton t-shirts always comes out wrinkly, but more costly, thicker cotton t-shirts (such as some I just bought on sale from Eddie Bauer) never wrinkle.</p>
<p>My newer dryer has a wrinkle reducing feature. Maybe some older dryers have it as well, stops, spins, stops, a few spins at the end as it cools. . I don’t use softener, and like to put most things on hangers, if I want them to look nice. </p>
<p>Some of this depends on where and how you live. My midwestern town, casual, I wear knits and jeans, sweaters in winter, scrubs to work. Put the jeans on a hanger, smooth them out, and they don’t look wrinkled. </p>
<p>Do all your kids know how to iron? I ironed my own dresses starting in 5th grade. My kids need some direct instruction in ironing, and they seem to not care at all about being unwrinkled. Never a need when they were younger, as they wore knits, and it is a casual town.</p>
<p>
Why does the OP assume it’s only women doing the ironing? My husband irons everything he wears, including his undershirts. He goes through lots of starch. I, on the other hand, iron maybe once a month. I hang and/or fold everything right out of the dryer and believe I am every bit as presentable as my husband. </p>
<p>When I was young, one of my daily chores was to iron 10 pieces of clothing. That included sheets and pillowcases. I found that to be a bit ridiculous and wouldn’t dream of ironing my sheets and pillowcases now, but I get that some people like that. </p>
<p>If I had a nickel for every can of starch my husband has used in 26+ years of marriage …</p>