Laundry on Vacation

[disneyofcourse]

I bring a trash bag in my luggage. I'll toss dirty clothing in nightly and then just pack it back up in a suitcase to go home. I hate the idea of dirty stuff in clean luggage so I make sure to use bags and tie them.

 

[daisyduck123]

For me, it's NOT a vacation if I have to cook, clean, or do laundry.


I take the dirty clothes home with me. They've got to get done sometime. Why would I want to do them during my vacation? I just do them at home.

 

[disneyofcourse]

Unless we are renting a villa in Orlando when doing Disney, we usually take our dirty clothes home with us. I just put them in a plastic garbage bag to seperate them from the clothing that is still clean. I have never come home with smelly luggage, but then our clothes don't stink after we wear them .

Maybe its just you who can't smell the stink?

 

[lizabu]

I like to pack light and do laundry half way through. It's easy enough to do. You can go out to the pool or have something to eat while the clothes wash. We put dirty clothes in bags and I won't put them in the suitcase until the last possible moment. I don't want to smell up the suitcases. From the time I finally pack to getting home the laundry's only in there a few hours. I wash as soon as I get home. I'm paranoid about bringing creepy crawlies home from a hotel. Even if I didn't see a single creepy crawlie I still want to wash everything just in case.

 

[tzeitel]

I do one load in a 8-10 day trip. I (try to) pack very light () - basically 2 tops per bottom, 2 pairs of shoes each and a toiletries bag. 3 of us in a suitcase with room to spare for souveniers. I do pack a super light extra bag and that is where I put whatever is dirty at the end of the trip.

DD always wants to swim after we get back from the parks so on laundry day DH goes with her and I wash clothes - and take a trip to the gift shop while I wait. I bring detergent samples that I've saved up and I have a small change wallet full of quarters

Forgot to add that this year we are flying Southwest so I might go crazy and try to go "no laundry" since we will have 3 free bags

 

[mrodgers]

After a week of vacation, what is 2 loads of laundry when you get home? Everyone makes such a big deal about laundry, are we the only ones with regular automatic washing machines? Does everyone else hand wash all their clothes?

Laundry doesn't take an hour. It takes about 30 seconds to toss them in, then you leave and let the machine do the work. 5 seconds switching from washer to dryer and leave it again. I certainly don't take an hour doing laundry.

We toss in a garbage bag in the closet. When packing up, we don't worry about clean and dirty clothes, we just toss it all into the laundry when we get home.

 

[jackie101]

I normally do laundry on vacation, but end up with dirty clothes. I put them in trash bags inside my suitcase. But then I always end up re-washing everything when I get home . I feel like they get musty in the suitcase/airport

 

[disykat]

I used to have a dirty clothes bag and if I was bringing home laundry we'd just move clothes around and stuff the bag into one suitcase.

Since my kids are older now, I usually have everyone take an old pillowcase and deal with their own laundry in their own suitcase. Odor has never been an issue.

I think letting the dirty laundry breathe a bit rather than stuffing it immediately into a plastic bag keeps the odors down.

 

[ilovemk76]

If the vacation is over a week we take half the clothes we need and wash them in the middle of the vacation. On shorter vacations we do not do laundry.

We pack our dirty laundry and take it home.

 

[sookie]

i'm kind of anal about this. I absolutely HATE to carry around dirty clothes, and I wash all clothes after they are worn (i'm sorry but everyone stinks).
However, when I get home, I really worry about "hitchhikers" aka bedbugs. I have heard that they love to catch a ride in suitcases. I don't have any bugs in my house and i don't want them!!!
So, I usually do laundry if needed, but I will still unpack the suitcase in the garage and then take the clothes inside to be washed immediately. After a couple of days I then will take the suitcase up to the attic to be stored.

 

[jenjifer]

Ha! Didn't realize laundry was such a polarizing issue.

I'm of the "pack light and do laundry" mindset. Last time, I found $12 in the otherwise empty washing machine. I call it good karma. For me anyhow.

 

[stitchlovestink]

Rarely do I do laundry while on vacation. It's my vacation too, and I hate doing laundry. I will in the event of an emergency or such...
But you asked what do you normally do...
so here's what we normally do, I take a couple of those really HUGE (those super huge ziploc bag, you know the ones you could put a kid in!) and a heavy duty duffel bag with us. We (actually, I...) pack all of the dirty clothes in the ziploc bag and then put it in the duffel to come home. We always fly Southwest so we never have to worry about checked baggage. And then it frees up the good luggage space for our souvies. Which we always seem to have a TON of!! One time I managed to bring home 43 Christmas ornaments! I still haven't figured out how that one happened! But in my defense, we go to the two Disney store outlets owned by Disney and I do buy quite a bit of my stuff there.

 

[monorailsilver]

I wash laundry almost everyday on vacation. I use the time to relax in the pool either mid day or at night. It only takes 1 hour. I hate the idea of packing dirty laundry in my luggage. This also cuts down the the amount of clothes we have to take in the first place.

We do that too.

I think there was one day I didn't do laundry & boy did it pile up & with the tiny Disney washers-at home it would of been 1 load but there it was 2.

But the last night we are there, I can't do that laundry so it just goes in a bag in the suitcase.

 

[Claire&TheBoys]

I never do laundry on vacation. I take a couple of garbage bags and we put our dirty clothes in them after they are worn. At the end of the trip, I'll combine to put all the un-worn clothes in one of the kids' suitcases, odds and ends in another, and cram the laundry into the largest suitcase. Or, since we drive, I can just throw the laundry bags into the back of the van. I typically do laundry just a few times a week anyway, so it's no big deal for me to do multiple loads the day after we get back.

I suppose if we stayed in DVC accommodations where a washer/dryer were readily available, I might toss in a load here and there. However, we have only stayed at the hotel resorts and I don't want to sit around waiting for laundry to wash/dry.

 

[deuceswild10]

I've done laundry once on vacation, when we were gone for two weeks. Otherwise, no, never.

It's vacation. No laundry.

 

[clh2]

I do not plan to do laundry on vacation. However, I am prepared to do laundry on vacation.Now - when we were on our cruise - I do recall doing a couple of loads - due to food and or beverages "jumping" onto DD's clothes - so I did whatever else worked with that outfit.

We bring 3 13-gal garbage bags with us. We sort laundry at home, on a daily basis and we do that on vacation too. So - at the end of the vacation one of us gets the "darks", one gets the "lights" and one gets the "whites". When we get home - the first suitcase in the house gets its laundry bag washed first - then we unpack (leaving the other 2 bats at the laundry room.) We are then everything else is usually unpacked prior to the first load going in to the dryer. Depending on the time - then we do load two - then (again depending on the time) load 3.

The part that "makes this work for us" is that the laundry gets presorted during the week. We do this at home too - so - it isn't "extra" work on the vacation.

 

[BLAZEY]

I have a 2 year old who is potty training so, when we go away I try my best to book a hotel with laundry facilities,take a pop up hamper and save my soap samples. I have a ziplock bag in my luggage with the necessary supplies and usually to a load midway or the last day before the end of our trip. Most recently we took a trip (non disney) and the w/d was next to the free breakfast room, so I went down early left the kiddo with my mom in the room, put the laundry on, went back to the room finished getting kiddo ready, went down for breakfast. Midway through breakfast, switched it over, went back to the room to get our stuff for the day, cam back took 5 min to fold it while pulling it out of the dryer and took it back to the room 10-15 mins of effort on my part and no sticky, stain kid clothes.
I don't mind doing laundry .... dishes on the other hand

 

[Carina]

I do it once on vacation. Less to pack that way and not so much work to do at home. I bring the 3-in-1 laundry sheets in a ziploc baggie. We collect our dirty laundry in a dollar store pop up hamper. Easy peasy!

Us too! Love them!

We pack for our trip in suitcases organized per person ( moms suitcase, dads suitcase etc) we come home in suitcases that are organized clean and dirty. I try and make it 4 clean suitcases and one dirty ( the one that holds the clothes we were wearing the last day when I was packing and doing laundry and the last nights jammies)

I will happily pay the few bucks to be washing 3 loads at once while we organize and pack the room, to be able to arrive home open all the lean suitcases and put all that stuff right away. Sure beats the avalance of laundry we come home from camping with ( no laundry services when we camp)

 

[herdtoDisney]

I don't want to do laundry on my vacation! But when we were at Pop last year, I did end up putting all our towels and swimsuits to wash and dry because I didn't want to take them home damp and getting funky.

Truth is, I always wash EVERYTHING we take on vacation, as soon as we get home. I actually put the suitcases right in the basement and start unloading them into the machine. It's just a 'thing' I have to do

 

[burnurcomputer]

Laundry every day on vacation is not that big of a deal for us at all We are a family of 6 (7 at Disney) and we can pack less, have less to carry and it costs less to pay for checked bags!