When A-Rob and I walked down the aisle seven years ago, I vowed to love him for better or for worse.
I did not, however, make any vows about ironing (phew!).
I know it’s my duty as a good wifey to make sure he is pressed and polished when he walks out the door. But standing over a hot iron in my spare time is not so much on my radar of things to do. Thankfully, A-Rob doesn’t expect this of me.
But the problem is, he doesn’t iron either. Left unchecked he’d be going out into the world wearing a wrinkled button-down.
So I do the next best thing, and send his shirts out to get laundered.
As he pulls on those fresh crisp shirts every morning, I get a warm feeling knowing I am carrying out my duties as a wife. And he’s cute, so that helps, with the warm feeling part.
But when it comes to cutting back on the monthly budget, the dry cleaning bills are a likely first stop. Especially since we seem to use the most expensive dry cleaner on the face of this planet.
They once gave us a bottle of sparkling wine for Christmas. That was my first clue.
Our dry cleaner is so easy though, they pick up and drop off at my office and all I have to do is remember to bring the red bag on Mondays (which is actually kind of hard sometimes).
But this past summer, our money had dried up along with our summer lawn. You see, no one hires musicians in the summertime, because no one wants to throw a party when it’s a thousand degrees outside. And our savings reserves were quite low due to some unforeseen expenses.
So I decided to take matters into my own hands and (gulp) iron A-Rob’s shirts. I planned a marathon ironing session over 4th of July weekend.
I’m lucky my mother was standing by that day, because I would have busted a sane-vein if she didn’t come and take over.
It wasn’t so much the ironing part, but the fighting off the kids who wanted to steal my spray bottle part, then the yelling at the kids who did steal my spray bottle part, then the crying and yelling kids who couldn’t have the spray bottle part.
My kids really like spray bottles.
But I saved $29, and that was kind of cool.
And now I’m taking this dry cleaning savings idea to a whole new level: I’m dropping off my clothes at the $2.25 dry cleaner. That’s right, $2.25 for any item, instead of $7 for a pair of womens lined pants. And they only charge $1.75 for pressing shirts.
It’s not as easy as my Sparkling Wine Cleaners, because I actually have to get out of the car. That part kind of sucks.
And I’m kind of scared they’re going to ruin my clothes. I mean, if I pay $7 for someone to clean my pants, they better be pristine. But if I’m only spending $2.25, I’m thinking my expectations should be lower (???)
So these are the topics of discussion for the day, dear readers, because I want to know…
- Do you use discount dry cleaners? If so, please tell me they don’t destroy entire wardrobes.
- Or maybe you’re smart and don’t even buy clothes that have to be dry cleaned, is this you?
- Have you ever had to fight with your dry cleaner? I may need tips if this doesn’t work out.
October 21, 2010 at 3:51 PM
I don’t use the drycleaners, but I don’t mind ironing as much as you do I guess. BF hates it so I do it for him.
I kind of get a rush of making wrinkles disappear
October 21, 2010 at 9:48 PM
I can understand that. My mom is the same way :)
October 21, 2010 at 6:05 PM
My mom taught me how to iron when I was 7. I was tired of wearing pretty dresses once and then growing out of them before they came out of the ironing basket.
We do not currently own an iron (ironing has gone the way of bed-making in this household). If you’re not really into sharp creases… for day to day teaching stuff you can do well just by taking the clothing out of the dryer right away and directly hanging it up. Somehow my husband manages to get nice creases in his khakis just by folding them and hanging them right away, but I can’t do that with my own pants (I figure it adds to my absent minded professor look).
A trick I used in college for wrinkly clothing was to run the shower on hot water, turn it off after the area got steamy, and then hang up whatever wrinkled clothing needed to be unwrinkled, shut the door and come back later.
I have several washable dress suits and 5 pairs of dry-clean only pants and a few dry clean only jackets. I also have a couple of dry-clean only sweaters. Mostly I dryel them in the dryer. Every once and a while when the creases diminish or I actually spill something I will take them to the dry cleaners for the full treatment.
We’ve never had a problem with a dry cleaner, though I think the dry cleaners we could walk to on the way to work in Boston are better than the best dry cleaners in town here.
October 21, 2010 at 9:50 PM
Dryel – I haven’t thought of that. Hmmm. Something to consider. I like to follow the spray-bottle-then-smooth-with-hand method of unwrinkling for my own clothes, unless I magically have 10 extra minutes in the morning, then I do it properly.
January 1, 2011 at 1:11 AM
Thankfully, my husband does his own ironing. And I’m the person who doesn’t own clothes that need to be ironed. Because I hate ironing. I never got the hang of it, possibly because my mother didn’t teach me how to do it. I suppose she thought it was common knowledge. And it probably is. But I had such a rough time with it when I moved away for college that I just decided to donate all my clothes that needed ironing and wear clothes that don’t instead. Ah, the good life!
January 1, 2011 at 5:09 PM
I know, I have a few shirts of my own that need to be ironed. I rarely wear these clothes, unless I find myself with 10 extra minutes in the morning, or unless I’m willing to be late.