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Over the past year or so I have found myself looking for ways to improve on tiresome but necessary processes around the house. One of those necessities is LAUNDRY! We all have to do it, some of us have a lot more of it than others, so how can we do it better? I started by looking at the products we used and quickly decided there had to be a better way!
Washing Clothes
Those messy jugs of liquid laundry detergent that always drip, are heavy and generate a huge amount of plastic waste, had me wondering was there another option? So I did some research and found a couple of options. One was laundry detergent sheets, these are handy, mess free and come in a paper envelope, so there is very little to dispose of. These worked fairly well and are certainly easy to pack for travel and good to have on hand. Then I discovered Dropps. This brand is doing great things for the environmental aspects of cleaning products for laundry and dishes. Their packaging is recyclable cardboard and contains little detergent pods that have no Bad Stuff (BS -as they say). The thing that struck me the most was all those other detergent pods were blue and green, Dropps were basically clear – which made me think, why would you put color in soap that you want to use to get stains out of clothes?? Enough said. It helped that the following facts about Dropps were so encouraging to me:
- plant derived eco-friendly ingredients
- water soluble outer film that dissolves in cold water
- free from dyes, phosphates and other chemicals
- does not contain perfumes or fragrance
- low-waste, plastic-free, 100% recyclable packaging
- no animal testing
- partner of Oceana to raise awareness of the plastic pollution in our oceans
Dropps laundry pods worked great, I used the Unscented Sensitive Skin and Baby Detergent for my kids clothes and I think they would work great for baby clothes and their sensitive skin. Most importantly, the clothes were clean – naturally! I have a front loading washing machine and the pods are so easy, just toss one inside the washer and go. These pods are definitely more efficient than measuring out liquid detergent and making a mess! I also tried the Active Wash Detergent Unscented for my workout clothes and they did a great job getting rid of the stink and also keeping the fabrics looking and feeling good.
Drying Clothes
So of course the next step after washing is to dry the clothes. I saw someone post about using 100% wool dryer balls instead of dryer sheets and thought, could they really work? Well the only way to determine if they worked was to try them for myself. Dropps also has these and they are bigger than the standard ones you might buy elsewhere. They do a great job, bouncing around the dryer and fluffing up the clothes and towels. I added a few drops of lavender essential oil to them and it makes everything smell terrific but not overpowering. Sometimes when you have a small load going you might hear them bouncing around a bit, but when you are running a normal sized load of laundry in the dryer I have not found this to be an issue. Don’t forget to clean your lint screen, when it is full it can be a fire hazard but also reduced the effectiveness of your dryer – just another efficiency tip. I did not find our clothes needed fabric softener while using the dryer balls, although if you would rather, Dropps also has a natural fabric softener product, I did not test that out. Another environmental bonus is not having all those dryer sheets going into landfills, not to mention what is on those sheets that makes things soft? Trust me, you would rather not know…
It is a good idea to hang dry things like workout clothes and other pieces that the heat of the dryer tends to degrade the fabrics. For that purpose we installed a couple of towel racks and they work great to hang up swimsuits and delicates, etc.
No Bad Stuff (BS) and Better for the Environment
While these small changes to my laundry routine haven’t changed the length of time it takes to get it done and doesn’t magically fold it and put it away in a timely fashion – the fact that what we are cleaning the things that touch our bodies with is free from chemicals and junk while also helping protect the environment from a lot of waste is a win in my book! New customers can get a 25% discount with code JOYFUL25 and existing customers get a 15% discount with code JOYFUL15.
