Well I Would't Want to Turn My Back on a Fellow Laundry, Um . . . Person. Well If We Can't Stick Together...

Tuesday marked one week since we moved into our new apartment. I can say we are officially moved in as of Tuesday. The pictures are on the walls, the furniture is arranged and we know where everything can be found (except the camera, which Drek packed in one of his bottomless boxes and I don't want to put in the effort to find) and life is more or less settling into a routine.

Today I'm doing the first deep-cleaning of the whole house. It won't take that long, the house is very small. Sadly, it's also missing washer and dryer hook-ups. When we signed the contract, I thought it would be fine and I could live with going to the laundry building to do laundry. Now, a week later, I remembered why we dropped everything to move out of our first teeny-tiny apartment and into a townhouse twenty minutes away, tripling our rent; so I could do laundry at home. Yeah, the triple rent was worth it. Why didn't I remember that BEFORE I signed the contract?

It kills me that we spent the time and money to buy a washer and dryer, that we've spent the time and effort to move that washer and dryer through three states, and that the washer and dryer are taking up valuable space in this teeny-tiny apartment, and yet, I am not using them, and that I can't use them for at least six months. Grr.

Oh, well. Life goes on and I suppose I could stand to learn a lesson on wearing the same thing over and over... and over again. The hard part is the babies. If they could get through a single night without leaking through their diaper, that would make things a lot easier.

At least I don't have to deal coins. This apartment complex gives everyone laundry cards. You load cash onto the card and then insert the card into the machine. It also makes it easier to know how much you've spent on laundry. For instance, I know that it one week I've spent exactly ten dollars and fifty cents in the machines, plus the cost of the soap. Although I suppose I'm not paying for the water of the electricity. Still, ten dollars?! That's a lot! Especially for someone who has never had to pay to do laundry before.

Yesterday we did laundry again. By "we" I mean me and the babies. Ash held the card to make herself useful. She a very helpful child. I ran out of money on the card so I picked through the laundry basket and only washed the most important stuff in one load. While we were waiting for the laundry to finish I took the babies swimming in the pool because it is right next to the laundry building. We had a great time. We played in the pool until Ash got too cold, then we sat in the sun until we warmed up, then we played in the pool again. To get the babies, the wet swim suits, the dirty laundry I couldn't do, and the clean laundry I did do, all back to the apartment, I had to make three trips, taking the babies with me each time. It was...exhausting.

There has to be a better way. I've heard of doing laundry in your own bathtub, anyone know how to do that? I already make my own laundry soap, can I make my own washer? I suppose that's not the hard part; the hard part would be drying the wet clothes. We have no yard, we're not allowed to hang laundry on our patio, and when I tried to dry the clothes in our front room it took two days because of the humidity, and that was after they had spent a cycle in the dryer. If they're dripping wet I can't have them over the carpet. Hmmm, this might take a little creativity.