Eliot's Travels

Laundry

This shows our little laundry and utility room. Miles wears his favorite shirt and thinks really hard about what to do next. A few comments about laundry in Holland:
* I ruined more clothes here than I thought possible. Sometimes everything would turn blue - even when I didn't wash anything new. I mean loads that I had essentially done at home with no problem. For my first ruined clothes, I used the "wit" detergent without really thinking about it. Using white detergent designed to pull out color was not so good for my dark loads. But even after I figured that out, I still had problems. I don't know if it was the temperature of the water or the strength of the soap here, but man it was frustrating.
* Apparently, dryers are a fairly new thing to Holland. Only in the last 5 years have they become common in peoples houses. Most houses aren't wired for both appliances, so there is a switch to run either the washer or the dryer. Most people dry some or all of their clothes on a drying rack or a line. I can see why given how much our clothes aged in just 9 months here.
* Our dryer was not ventilated so all the water collected in a tank or compartment that you had to empty out after each load. Gina told me about the tank: SO that's why our 3rd and 4th loads weren't drying! Miles loved to run in and help me empty the tank. He especially liked to put the plastic tub back in it's spot (top left).
* The washer would take 1.5 hours to wash a load; the dryer followed for 45 to 60 minutes. That's way too long for each load.

posted by Whitney @ 5:34 AM