This article was prompted by a call from my sister Carolyn this weekend. The weird thing is, she called me with a laundry question while I was at the laundromat- -doing laundry. She wanted to know what else she could do to get lingering odors out of her older towels. I suggested burning them, but that apparently wasn't an option she was comfortable with.

She was going to try one of those scent additives along with her fabric softener and see if that made a difference. I thought this tactic couldn't hurt and as always, I tell her that hot water, not warm, (yes, I know this is not an energy efficient setting) kills dust mites and gets rid of a multitude of other towel and bedding issues.

That made me wonder how often a person should really wash bath towels and then Meaghan Murphy, the executive editor of Good Housekeeping magazine showed up on the Today Show with some great tips and advice.

  • Towels- If you're using your bath towel everyday, you should be washing it after its third use. Hand towels should be changed out or washed every one to two days as they are used much more often. She says warm water is fine, (many other sources I checked disagreed) and if you have odor issues add a half cup of baking soda to the wash.
  • Sheets & pillowcases- Change weekly. (I usually wash sheets, pillowcases and towels all together in hot water and every 4th wash I pour in 1/4 to 1/2 half a cup of bleach along with the detergent and everything is fresh and dust-mite-free. If you're leery of using bleach on your colored sheets and towels, don't, but do use hot water).
  • Mattress cover- Wash every few months, or monthly if you have allergy issues in your family.
  • Pillows- Wash one to two times a year in a machine without an agitator. (I'll be honest, the one time I washed a pillow, it turned into a lumpy mess & now I just toss them after a couple years and get new ones.)

 

 

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