apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Sheets: once a week
Pillowcases: twice a week
Towels: Alternate between two bath towels and wash both once a week and hand towels once a week.

Our routine is basically the same as yours, might be a bit more often with sheets (we have a toddler, who likes to climb to our bed).
I once had a BF, who had traveled for business A LOT, so he used to and insisted on using a towel just once and throw it on a floor... so he would go through like 2-3 towels A DAY!

I, too, send it all to the wash about once a week. This topic brought back crazy college memories! I will NEVER forget a dorm-mate of mine snidely commenting, "My mother says your washing your towels only once a week is disgusting!" Yeah. What a peach.

At least once every 2 weeks, and would be much more often if it didn't require a trek to the laundrymat. Towels get 3-4 days before getting tossed in the laundry bag.

Sheets once every 4 to 6 weeks and towels once a week. Wow I feel like a slob now, but I'd definitely change them more often if I could easily get them off the bed. The bed is against the wall so it's a totally pain and I usually end up slicing my hands on the bed frame. We also have about 10 pillows and changing all those pillowcases is endless.

hand towels - twice a week.
towels and sheets - every week (summer) or every other week.

2-3 towels a week.
Sheets - once in 2 weeks.
Blankets - once in a month.

I have lots of bath and hand towels and a ton of face cloths and I end up using 2-3 hand towels and face cloths a week and 1 bath towel a week. I also change the sheets once a week and pillow case 2X a week.

I do hate the way the stitching around the towel shrink. Anyone knows how to avoid that?

I wash the sheet about every other week and towels after one use. I can't stand a musty smell on the towels!

Bed sheets and pillow cases once a week, I also shower pre-bed so my they stay cleaner.
mattress cover - once a month
towels - I'll use 2 times and I'll do a load of them when I run out of clean ones.

1 towels and pillow cases once per week and sheets once every 2 weeks. If I had my own washing machine I would prefer to do everything once a week.

I probably change the sheets once a month. Sometimes I'll wash the pillowcases more often. Towels every two weeks? Who has the time to do laundry more often than that?

Sheets and duvet cover once a week, pillowcases every day. Bath towels once a week other towels as needed.

You're supposed to wash towels and sheets?

towels and sheets every two weeks...and since 6 of those days are spent at the significant other's, i figure it's not that bad. :-P

I change pillowcases once a week, rest of the bedsheets get changed monthly, and at the same time we rotate our mattress.

Towels... I guess I toss mine after about two weeks? When it feels dirty. I use a different one for my body and then my hair / face, so the hair one doesn't get changed as often or it downgrades to becoming the body towel...

We stayed at an upscale hotel, and they changed the towels twice a day! It was madness!

Sheets are changed every Sunday, but duvets can go 2-4 weeks between washes (depending on what/if I spill while breakfasting in bed)

I run through about 3-4 towels a week, and the same number of face cloths - SF is very humid and towels simply don't dry out well enough before getting musty.

Isn't there a difference between how often you do laundry and how often you change out the towel? From the comments here, it sometimes reads like people have only one towel and they wash it every week (or whenever) and then immediately use it again.

I have eight bath towels, and I do laundry every two weeks. If all eight are in the laundry then I wash all eight. If only four are in the laundry I wash all four. But either way, I only use my towel 4 or 5 times in a row. But I can't stop my boyfriend or guests from using a towels for longer or shorter amounts of time. And come on - we've all had to grab the bath towel at some point to get spilled or splashed water. And then you need a new one.

My husband and I differ a lot on sheets and towel usage too. I grew up seeing my parents who were very picky about santization but still being frugal. They used to put used towels on a hanging rack in sunshine for couple of hours and let it dry. And as i live in south bay , i usually have ample sunshine I still do the same thing after every shower, if the weather is good and keep using them for a week or two. After all they are just damp towels and dryed our "clean" bodies with it. If the weather is otherwise...they go in laundry after 3-4 usage.

But that's just my way of doing it... and seems Okay to me.. but I haven't done any research on pros&cons of just drying the towels.

Go through 2 towels a week, and change the sheets once a month. Might do the sheets more often if it didn't involve me lugging them to the cleaners. In-building laundry, how I long for you...

Wow. I'm pretty in line with this.

Which is crazy, because all those home decor sites/shows say to do these things every single day! Which is wasteful, unrealistic and just plain unnecessary. Glad to see it's far from the norm.

I mean, if sheets and towels smell clean, than they probably are clean. And my sheets and towels tend to smell wonderful for around a week. When they stop smelling like lavender fields or mountain air (or whatever my detergent is scented like) I toss 'em in the wash. It's not rocket science.

7-12x for towel use, depending on how many showers taken at home or if after gym; sheets/pillowcases, once every 1 1/2-2 weeks. If guests come over, sheets and towels go in after guests leave, and oh yeh, I iron all my sheets and pillowcases.

allergies... so sheets are washed once a week in the extra hot wash cycle.
comforters and blankets every other month.
towels once a week

I change my sheets about once a month. I shower before bed, so I am always getting into bed clean. I use each towel twice before throwing it into the hamper, but each shower gets a clean washcloth. Hand towels are replaced every 3-4 days. I have 8 towels and 12 washcloths, so I wash a load of towels about every 2 weeks.

i change the hand towels twice a week, bath towels once a week, or more when the weather is too humid... cause i don't have those towel heaters. my mom has one of those and it's great.

the sheets: in the summer once a week and in the winter once every two weeks.

this is how often i change them, not wash...
cause i only wash them after it piles up... :) since i use more softener* in them than in clothing.

*sorry, don't know how to translate this, it's liquid detergent meant to soften your clothes.

All of it once a week.

I do laundry once a week (I live in an apartment and have to pay or go to a family members house to do laundry) so I wash my sheets whenever I do.

However, I have a duvet cover that I only wash once I feel like it start to get "dirty" which means not great smelling.

I actually don't wash my towels that often because of the same no-washer problem. They add a lot of bulk to my wash and thus make laundry day longer and more of a pain. I would say I wash them once or twice a month. But if I use them for the floor or clean up anythign then I definitiely don't use them again until washed.

But I pretty much always use the same two towels that I am particular to. They have to be a certain thickness. I don't like overstuffed towels.

Ok, I'll admit it... I'm so bad at washing sheets. :(
I usually wash them once every 2-3 months, but I have 2-3 sets so they're only on there for about a month.

Pretty much the same thing with towels too.

Sheets and towels once every two weeks or so. The duvet cover, when it needs it. Admittedly, my sweetie does the wash, otherwise this would happen a lot less often. Coin-op washing is expensive, yo.

I take comfort in the fact that I'm saving water & energy by only washing the towels every 2 weeks, and the sheets every 3-4 weeks....

But then, we shower before bed, and live in a non-humid place where the towels never really get musty, so I could imagine how I'd feel the need to wash more often if circumstances were different.

being a germophobe, it took me forever to be able to use a towel more than 1 or 2 days in a row. my max now is 4 days. you may be clean after a shower, but you are wiping a ton of skin cells & soap scum onto your towel.

sheets depend on puppy & allergies- every 2 weeks, once a month at worst, but if dustier (hvac running) or puppy is shedding, i try to do weekly. pillowcases get changed out weekly per oily skin. i keep enough sheets & towels around though to change them & just wash when it adds up.

i remember hating to take showers at an ex's place. he maybe washed the same 2 towels once a month or so and they always smelled awful! he also used to buy new boxers instead of washing the pile he had.

I worked with a guy who said it was disgusting to use a towel more than once. I'd hate to do his laundry.

I change my sheets every Sunday and generally use a towel for a week unless I notice that it has developed a not-fresh smell, then it's straight to the wash. If you hang it up right to let it dry out well, a week seems reasonable.

I try to change sheets and towels every two weeks, and *wash* them when I've got a full load (every 4-6 weeks).

you don't clean towels b/c they smell. you clean them b/c microscopic skin cells rub off on them and then decay. same with sheets, adding in oil, hair, etc.

i use a white washcloth per day (face only); one bath towel per week (one a day is decadent); change pillowcases weekly and sheets as the spirit moves me (2-3 times a month). i wash sheets when my laundry load is light enough or motivation is in high supply.

being able to bathe daily and do laundry efficiently (instead of by hand) are relatively recent luxuries that are taking vastly for granted in the west. within two or three short generations an entire culture has developed as normal these ideas based on the easy availability of heat, clean water, hot water and machines to do the labor without us having to manually scrub, wring or hang each garment.

no one would call a towel a week disgusting if they spent an entire day cleaning their lonely change of clothes.

I wash towels and sheets once a week most of the time. I have a neighbour with a family of four who previously washed towels after each use! That was 8 towels A DAY, minimum. Needless to say, once she got a full time job, her philosophy of towel-washing was out the window, and she now does them once a week like everyone else.

I'm neither a germ-a-phobe, neat freak or healthcare pro, but remember that your skin is your largest living organ. Drying off after bathing removes tons of dead skin cells and surface residue. Imagine brushing your teeth without washing out your toothbrush!

Towels are one per load of laundry, which is about once every week to week and a half. I shower every other day generally, though. I have two towels.

Sheets are about once every three or four loads, whenever I feel like doing two loads that day. Again, I have two sets.

One pillowcase, the one that is next to my face most often, gets washed with ever load.

There's more washing in the summer when I can hang things out to dry easily (and I'm more likely to shower daily/be sweaty/be oily).

I agree with Lady J. Sometimes I feel decadent with how much I do wash my items.

sheets every weekend, and rotate or turn the mattress at the same time. i must be a glutton for punishment.

towels every weekend, 1 or 2 towels per week depending on how much I'm traveling during the week.

we wash the sheets every weekend, and pillowcases twice a week. i have allergies and asthma, so i start sleeping poorly if it goes longer than that.

we use towels twice, replace hand towels 2-3 times a week, and use a fresh wash cloth each day.

I change the sheets every weekend and use towels usually twice before getting another one. This means usually 2 loads of washing a week for these items. I feel a bit spoilt when i read that some readers have to take their laundry to the laundromat. It is unheard of to not have your own washing machine at home here in Australia, although some big apartment buildings are now beginning to have shared laundry facilities rather than one in each apartment.

Once a week for sheets and towels.

If a towel gets stinky during the week, I'll obviously switch it for a second, but that usually only happens in the summer when it's humid and things don't dry as quickly.

This reminds me of seeing Oprah once (...oh, come on, you've seen her show too...) talk about liking her sheets washed every 2-3 days so they are always crisp, and whoever her guest was (maybe a doctor talking about hygiene or something) was like: most people don't have the luxury to change their sheets that often. She was honestly surprised at that answer.

How in the world does anyone have time to wash laundry twice each week?

We wash the sheets and towels every two weeks, just like the rest of the laundry. I've started doing the gym clothes every week, but that's just because I don't own enough sports bras to last for two weeks.

Ugh! If it were up to my husband we would never change the sheets, even until they were so worn they've lost their color and it starts making holes! If it were up to me, once a week, two max. But because laundry is his job, they usually get done once a month (because I can't stand it any longer, but he still drags his feet and complains the whole time).

Towels are very similar, but he's worse with the sheets (I think he just doesn't like having to make the bed...which is weird because I do that).

I change my bath and hand towels twice a week and my washcloth each day. Sheets are changed ever week or two.

once a week for sheets and towels. they are the only thing I still launder in HOT water.

all these reality shows about housewives and nannies have been a huge eye opener. i used to be confused as to why modern mom's are so time-cramped. a lot of women do laundry every day. and they feel bad if they're too tired to fold and put it away so the livingroom is neat again. stop doing it! once a week and that's that. how's it more convenient to have a home machine if you're constantly tied to it? the additional water and electricity can't offset the savings of not going to a laundromat. the only convenience is that you can run it at any hour and have exclusive access.

that comment about Australia was a big ! to me. what did people do before washing machines were invented? to have them in every unit instead of a designated room in a building is the exact opposite of the U.S. what building owner can't see the huge drain on resources, not to mention the additional risk of flooding and electrical fires. fascinating... my old building didn't have a laundry room. i pushed a cart up the steepest part of 181st Street NYC to the laundromat. lots of tenants had machines in their apartments. once a laundry room was installed everyone was notified to get rid of their machines.

I use my tovels only once, they never dry out ...ech!

Lady J -
Oh, I lived near the bottom of 181st St. in 1969-1971! I'm not sure, but I think it was #867. How I dreaded going up and down every day in winter, with the wind whipping around the curve. It was good for my weight control though - I often went hungry rather than drag the shopping cart all the way up to bus station, where the nearest supermarket was.

I've just had a wonderful trip down memory lane on Google Earth. I haven't been back since '71 but the neighborhood looks about the same. I see there's a Starbucks. When I moved there, there was one of the last original automats at the top of the hill, and my friends and I stayed there all night the day I moved in - I was the first to move out of my parents' house and it was thrilling. But the automat closed soon after.

In '72 I moved to San Francisco and often wondered if I would still think that hill was steep. But of course I've never had to climb a SF hill in snow & ice.

deniseb, that starbucks moved in five years ago, the year i moved away. there's nothing like trying to make it down that hill with ice on the ground. i once went 'round to 180 and walked down that street until it brought me back around to 181. much gentler incline.

Doesn't sound like much sex is going on if sheets are only needing changing every two weeks or once a month. Ewww...

Would do it every week, but since I have to trek to the laundromat, probably once a month. It's kindof gross. Oh, to have room for a washer/dryer!

Lady J - I think when moms talk about doing laundry every day... it's a load or two a day to keep up with demand. It would be far worse to try to get it all done in one day.

Granted... Americans have too much stuff!
When I was a kid, my mom did a load or two every couple of days to keep up with dad's work jeans and towels for a family of five. We were expected to use a towel for two days before tossing it in the laundry hamper. And jeans (except for dad's) were to be worn two or three times before hitting the hamper.

My brother and his wife are now living in the house we grew up in... with the same size family ... and Sis in law has NEVER seen the bottom of the laundry pile because she buys her kids too much crap! they wear it all once and into the laundry it goes.

I pay $2.50 to wash and dry a load of clothes, and I wash four loads once a week, on Saturday morning. Towels get washed every week, bedding gets washed every two weeks. I don't have the musty damp towel problem because I installed a 28" towel bar, which accommodates a standard-sized bath towel with no folding.

sheets- once a week
pillowcases- 2 x's a week ( for mine)
towels-every week-and lots of washrags that get all washed at one time.
I agree - not much going on if you hardly ever change your bed-ewww...

Sheets- Once a week ( a must)
Towels- I use 2-3 new towels a week.
Wash Cloths- I use a fresh one daily (too personal to use more than once)
Blankets-4-6 weeks

sheets-once a week a must
towels- use 2-3 a week and wash once a week
wash cloths- use a fresh one daily and wash them weekly
blankets- wash once a month

We try and do laundry three times a week.

Lots of Australians don't have the room or resources for an at-home laundry or washing machine, Erin. They wash things in bathtubs and at launderettes.

sheets- every three weeks or so
towels- use twice then use a fresh one
wash clothes- after i have company
duvet cover- maybe once a month

i'd like to do my sheets more, i mean, i have 3 different sets, it just always slips my mind.
growing up i'd use towels once and that was it. once i moved out on my own and had to pay for my own laundry i started using them twice. i have about 8 towels so i don't have to worry about running out.
i rarely use handtowels, so i typically don't wash them unless i have guests over and know they've been used.

i usually do laundry once every 10 or so days. by that time i've had enough dirty clothes and towels to make a full load of darks and a full load of lights.

Sort of off topic... but laundry related:

I have these hand towels from JCPenny Home Collection: Chris Madden "Spa Towels" (white). They are used normally: for clean wet hands. What I don't understand is how they almost instantly developed a gray color where you wipe your clean hands. They never seem to totally dry either. (I have no problem with the matching bath towels - except that one is tearing along the edge.) I've of course washed them and I've tried bleaching them.
Anyone have any ideas on what might be causing this grey nastiness? Thanks!

we only shower every other day or more often if we do heavy labor. We wash
bath towels after two uses, let dry and add to laundry basket.
wash cloths once and let them dry out and then add to laundry basket.
we dry our hands, after washing, on our bath towels (no need for hand towels, although I always put one out when a guest comes).

Sheets get changed every Sunday.
Pillow cases on our sleeping pillows get changed 2 times a week or more often if I get some residual makeup on it.
Pillows that match our sheets but are used for TV watching or decorative, are washed monthly.
Blankets get washed monthly.

vacuuming (Roomba) happens 3 times a week (I have horrible allergies, I have no choice). Vacuuming more often means less dust on the bed linens too.

Bathmats get washed once a week and every day after everyone is done with the bathroom, I go in and shake the mats into the tub and then clean up the dust and other debris with a piece of tissue. This keeps the mats fluffy and looking fresh, not to mention your feet clean.

If I have a guest over, and even if they only stay one night, I wash all their towels and sheets and put them back into the guest bedding box and in the closet with the blow up bed.

Sheets: Once a week. They are white so you can see every little stain, but even so I wouldn't have them for much more then a week.
towels: 2 towels per person per week. Bathmats ect or the handtowel in the guest toilet, that doesn't get used often I wash with the other towels once a week.

I am committed to chocolate brown sheets. I tend to only get to them once every 2-3 weeks because of crazy work and school schedules student broke-ness and an expensive machine. If there has been a lot of action however, I might take off the bottom sheet and put the unfitted sheet in its place until I get the chance.
I also try to keep the thermostat low to limit sweating.

Towels again are colorful. I wash them when I have change... I do switch them up about every week and a half. I tend to buy bamboo hand and hair towels to keep damp-towel bacteria at bay. Maybe I should switch to bamboo sheets too!