The Professional Expert

Laundry - Using the Dryer

Before you throw your clothes into the dryer, clean the lint screen. These are often located at the base of the door of the dryer. They can also be on the top of the dryer.

After putting the lint screen back. You can add your clothes.

Instead of adding them in one big clump, take the items out one at a time and shake them out a bit. This will help reduce the drying time and the wrinkles.

If there were any particularly nasty stains that you treated before washing, check on them now. The heat from the dryer may set the stain, so if it needs to be treated and run again, now is the time.

If you didn’t overload the washer, then your quantity for the dryer should be fine. Just like the washer, having too many clothes in the dryer increases drying time and decreases the dryer’s performance.

I personally don’t like fabric softener dryer sheets. They can leave oily spots on the clothes and are just one more layer of chemicals that I would wear against my skin all day (and night). They also reduce the absorbency of towels.

Most of your laundry can be dried at the normal setting. Towels will take a little longer than t-shirts. Take them out when they are just dry. Over drying just stresses the items.

The Permanent Press setting has an extra cool down time to help prevent wrinkles. But if you just take the clothing out when they are just dry, you won’t really have a problem with wrinkles.

Delicates should be dried on the delicate cycle. Washable wool should be dried with no heat. Better yet…these items should be air dried. I remember washing and drying my new wool sweater as if it was a t-shirt. After it came out of the dryer, I handed it down to my 6 year old cousin!

Tomorrow we’ll get out the iron…

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