Are You Handwashing Clothes During Covid-19?

In Manhattan how lucky am I to live in a highrise with a clean and modern laundromat in our basement? But during Covid-19, I'm scared to go down there to do laundry! I think catching the virus is a numbers game. If you don't have to go somewhere where unknowns are, don't do it! We are stopping the spread in lockdown by limiting our possible contacts with asymptomatic people who have it. So I made a point of doing all my laundry a few days before the lockdown started (washing my hands like a maniac in the laundry room) and only venturing down there once (to wash bed sheets and towels) after our lockdown began on March 22nd.

Since our sheltering at home, I sort of wear a pandemic

uniform consisting of easy-to-hand-wash garments: undies, t-shirts, socks and leggings. My pajamas are an over-sized t-shirt. And this week I began wearing a few Old Navy rayon swing dresses. All are relatively easy to hand wash and hang up to dry. (The only other times I ever handwash anything is while staying in a hotel for a week.)

Before the pandemic, you could not have gotten me to handwash my clothes at home! It would have felt like torture. I make a point of buying clothes that say: machine wash and dry. And yet, here we are! Actually, I was less afraid to touch the things in our community laundry room the 2nd time around then the 1st time at the beginning of our pandemic. Really, the coronavirus can't penetrate our skin. After we touch the common doors of washers and dryers, we just need to be careful not to touch our faces and wash our hands. A sink and liquid soap sit in our laundry room to do so. I'm more worried about other people coming into the laundry room while I'm down there, which didn't happen either time.

In fact, I learned a few things by handwashing my clothes in my bathroom sink:

1) I own far too many clothes I do not need and do not wear. I'm getting by just fine wearing my curated wardrobe!

2) Handwashing gets clothes surprisingly clean

and good smelling!

3) A good 10-15 minute soak in hot soapy water alone nearly cleans the clothes by itself and lessens the need for heavy-duty scrubbing. 

4) Dishwashing liquid is best for handwashing. I love using Palmolive with Oxy-ingredient. Cleans and smells great!

5) Don't be heavy-handed with the soap ... use only a squirt to clean the clothes. More soap doesn't get clothes any cleaner and requires more work to rinse out with clear water.

6) When handwashing, never let clothes pile up but wash 1 or 2 pieces daily, then hang them up to dry. I toss a couple of items into hot soapy water, take my shower and dry off, then finish the wash with a rub a dub, dub; and rinse.

7) Only squeeze the excess water out and leave it at that: The most unpleasant part of handwashing is wringing the rinse water out before hanging clothes up to dry. I find with cotton, spandex, and rayon, gravity is your friend! Clothes hung up at noon dry by the evening without squeezing every last drop of water out of the garment. It takes less squeezing than we initially think.

8) I decided against buying special equipment for daily handwashing only a few articles. You will need to get your hands wet (or use plastic gloves) ... but rubbing and swishing the clothes around the soapy water cleans as well as using washing boards, or washing stones, etc. So if these extras can't take over the manual labor, or clean better than our 2 hands, they are not worth the expense or the storage space they take up. 

If you have a salad spinner, it works to wring water out of clothes, but if not, wringing the excess water out, then letting gravity pull the rest out is fast enough.

As it turns out I'm a mean, clean machine! Moreover, my hands have never been cleaner when it matters most! And, I learned if I handwash 1 or 2 garments daily I only have to go down to the laundry room (to do bedding and towels) every few months! Since we're home all the time and not going out of the house much, plus nobody is visiting to use our bathroom towels, how dirty can they be?

So the question arises will I continue to handwash my t-shirts and socks after the worry of the pandemic ends? Hell no! After this passes, it will be too much work!😊😃


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Pandemic Sheltering In Place Fashion

Pandemic Sheltering In Place Fashion

Uniqlo for crew-neck t-shirts here. Pair with a cardigan on cold days.

According to The Talk, an afternoon TV show, many people who are Sheltering in Place are not bothering to change out of their pajamas or sweats into regular clothes since they can't go to work. Not true of me. I rise to shower, wash my hair and get dressed each and every morning ... later than usual but still! Being clean and tidy (wearing clean coordinated clothes) lifts my spirits! I couldn't deal with feeling sloppy and dirty on top of riding out a pandemic! But since I have nowhere to go, I don't have to fuss much with my wardrobe and can wear the same things over, which I do. Who's here to see it? I bet my neighbors aren't taking notes if we happen to pass (spaced properly apart) in the lobby.

Perhaps it would be entertaining to see my pandemic uniform. Everything featured I'm wearing as I write the blog.

Aeries - cotton with a touch of spandex lightweight Chill leggings here.

I stick to casual, comfortable and easy to maintain attire. Sometimes I get wild and crazy by changing the color of my t-shirts! One day I'm Lady pink, the next day Bonnie bluebell and the day after Fire Engine Red Deb. Woo-hoo! June Cleaver had her pearls, but I live in sleek ballet flats! Whoopee!

Merrell Nubuck Inde Ballet flats - discontinued - but I hope Merrell brings back another ballet flat, as they have more support than many other brands. These are my indoor shoes. They don't have enough support on concrete, which leads to the next image. :) No link since it's discontinued - there are a few on Ebay.

Furthermore since rarely leaving home, I sometimes hand wash the leggings or t-shirts in Woolite, or dishwashing soap and hang them up in the bathroom to dry before bed. The less I have to go down to our common laundry room, the better. Being at home constantly, this bit of handwashing gives a gal a small sense of accomplishment. What is there to dooo next? Let me at it!

NAZAROO Shoe Insoles Arch Support Inserts (here) are excellent to keep my high arches happy in my Merrell ballet flats. With insoles I should be able to turn them into outdoor shoes this summer. We'll see.

To be safe I wear two sets of shoes, one for inside and another for outdoors. I also spray the soles of my outdoor shoes with 3% hydrogen peroxide at the door to kill any possible virus, and sometimes the soles of my indoor shoes because I walk down the hallway in them to put trash in the dumpster. 

Once in a while to make myself happy, I put on a bracelet in my apartment. But I stopped wearing makeup and jewelry to go outside to buy groceries. I mean, why wear anything under a face mask? It would only get the mask dirty. And rings on fingers when you're forever worrying about Coronavirus and washing your hands? I think not!

Merrell Dassie - my outdoor to the supermarket shoes here.

To be honest, if we weren't all in the same boat, I couldn't bear staying home for so many weeks. Yet I can get through this challancing time knowing how EVERYONE all over the globe must do the same to fight this disease. Indeed, we are all in this together ... and some of us are very lucky to be sheltering in a comfortable home. It turns out the things we need are quite simple!

What are you wearing at home during this pandemic?



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