Kind of obvious - Hang out your clothes

[sparks]

Thanks for the Christmas Eve snow Wifezilla !..I remember my Mom hanging clothes out in the winter and sometimes having to finish drying in the oven. Of course I have 10 brothers and sisters!

 

[chrissum]

How long does it take to dry clothes outside in the winter? I am in NW MO and it can get pretty cold but I would like to try it. I see the Amish line dry all year long but I was wondering how long it would take!

 

[reinbeau]

Depends on the humidity, really. If it's one of those clear, dry days with the temps in the teens they may freeze at first, but they dry really fast!

 

[hwillm1977]

We line dry all summer, and in the winter we string lines back and forth across the kitchen and dry the clothes around the woodstove. It's inconvienient to duck around laundry while you're trying to cook, but it saves money on the electric bill.

Once January sets in our temps can be around -30 to -40 for weeks at a time, there's no way I'm hanging wet clothes outside then

We pay 12.8cents a KWH here so it adds up really quickly. According to our dryer, it uses about 4KW when on, and we usually do one load of laundry a day... so that's 4KWH/day we're saving... or about $16/month.

Every little bit counts

 

[River Runner]

We use the clothes line spring, summer and fall. In the winter we have a line put up in the basement. We use a furnace for heat and this helps dry the clothes pretty fast.

 

[miss_thenorth]

We use the clothes line spring, summer and fall. In the winter we have a line put up in the basement. We use a furnace for heat and this helps dry the clothes pretty fast.

 

[deb4o]

Iam not lucky enough to have a basement, and I am affraid DH just would not deal well with dodging lines of clothes all over the house, So this is my solution, I have an accordion style dryer that I use year around, it sits in the family room. Then when I do blanets or sheets,in the winter,I stretch them over the dining room chairs.Not a look I 've seen in "houe beautiful" but it works.As a matter of fact I washed our flannel sheets this morning and hung them up by the time I got home at 3:30 they were almost dry, just took a short fluff in the dryer.I hope to get an umbrella line outside in the spring.

 

[chrissum]

Depends on the humidity, really. If it's one of those clear, dry days with the temps in the teens they may freeze at first, but they dry really fast!

Thanks reinbeau, I'll give it a try and monitor the humidity, I have a basement but am still wanting to try outdoors in the winter time.

 

[Wifezilla]

My mom used to "freeze-dry" our clothes when we lived in Northern Wisconsin...LOL

 

[River Runner]

Miss_The north, thanks for the welcome, looks like a great place. Looking forward to posting and learning here.

Wifezilla, we still use the freeze dry method with bedding, works great, my wife decided to get rid of our dryer after it set in the basement for three years and has not been used. I am going to build a laundry table there for keeping the soap, fabric softener and add a small sink where the dryer set.
My mother uses the freeze dry method with all her clothes, she uses a dryer only on the coldest days, and she is 75.