Cleaning the linen closet

[Patty A]

Do you have a favorite way to organize your linen closet?
How many extra sheets and blankets do you call enough?
Do you use dryer sheets to keep things smelling good?
Do you remember to rotate your sheets, or do you use the same ones over and over?

I am looking for ideas to make it more organized, my kids are awful about just throwing stuff in!

Help! I need ideas please!!

[cheles2kids]

If you store your sheet sets into their own pillowcase, it makes it much easier to stack them and the whole set is right there together.

Another thing, if you like candles and buy extra to keep on hand (especially during the winter months), keep them stored in a basket in your linen closet to help keep it smelling good. (I only buy one scent when it comes to candles, so I'm not sure how it would work if you had multiple scents?)

Also, if you don't have room in your linen closet to store your beach towels, store them in a summer clothing box and just pull them out in the Spring, along with the summer clothes.

Depending on the width of your shelves, also would depend largely on how you fold your towels. Sometimes a double fold will work, sometimes if you have smaller shelves you may have to do a triple fold.

For washclothes, again, depending on how many you have. Keep a basket close to your tub and your batheroom counter and store them in there. This keeps them at arms reach and frees up extra space in the closet.

I forgot to answer some of your questions:
I keep two sets of sheets per bed-One that is one there now & an extra for changings.
I keep 2 weeks of washclothes-4 people in my household x 14 (days in 2 weeks)=48
I keep 4 handtowels per bathroom=2 x 4=8
I try to keep at least 3 bathtowels per person-4 x 3=12 (and a couple extra for overnight visitors)

I wash towels usually once per week, sometimes twice, when we're done drying off, we hang up our towel to use for the next shower and we use the same one all week.


Maybe some of these ideas will help?

[Laurie in Bradenton]

I keep 2 sets of sheets cotton ones for spring and summer and flannel ones for fall and winter. I wash sheets on Monday Morning and put them right back on Monday Afternoon.
Do the smae thing with blankets a light cotton one and a heavy quilt.
As for towels I bought a dozen plain white ones they rotate from bath to washer.
Washcloths live on the back of toliet rolled up in a basket.

My linen closet has 5 shelves. Very top one has extra mattress pads stored on it heated ones during the warm monthes and the unheated ones during the cool monthes.
Next shelf has sheets
Then extra tissue boxes, shampoos and bath items. Main bath has a pedstal sink so no storage. All extra items store in linen closet.
Next shelf is extra TP .
The floor has our overnight case for traveling. Since we work out of town this gets used alot and needs to be available to leave all the time.

I find that soap bars keep this closet smelling best.
Laurie in Bradenton

[ladykemma2]

Do you have a favorite way to organize your linen closet?
How many extra sheets and blankets do you call enough?
Do you use dryer sheets to keep things smelling good?
Do you remember to rotate your sheets, or do you use the same ones over and over?

welcome to my addiction, erm, passion.

i keep a nice linen closet but it's just me. no kids. i use an armoire. Pajamas and blankets are in there too. Towels are elsewhere.

i keep incense, smudge sticks, and resin incense stored in there as well- smells nice. it's my annual stash from ren faire.

i use real irish linen sheets, from fergusons in ireland. Keeping a real "linen" linen closet is different way of thinking. Real linen sheets in olden times were used as dowry, as currency, and were brought by a bride into her marriage. real linen sheets were an ungodly expensive investment and the wife usually bought or made one linen sheet a year for her household.

i keep 6 top flat "european king" sheets and 6 bottom flat "european superking" sheets for one bed. the top sheets are smaller than the bottom sheets.

it's a hobby to keep them up. first, at 500 bucks a sheet, I mend, darn and sew. they get washed in the machine on "handwash" and in cold water. No bleach ever. they can't go into the dryer, so i lay them on the grass in the sun to dry. they are marked with linen marker the year purchased. Some are monogrammed.

Every august they are inspected, counted and mended. For example, this year i had an unexplained hole in the sheet i bought august 2007 so i had to patch it with some old linen. i had a worn edge on a ten year old sheet (1998) so folded it over and sewed a new seam along the edge.

I buy a new linen sheet a year, and take the oldest ones to make pillowcases. I turn the sheets when they get thin in the middle (cut down the middle and sew selvages together).

when the sheets get really old, they get made into chemises, partlets, and ruffs, pillowcases, or used for patching.

i have one heavy blanket and one thin blanket. in houston texas it doesn't get cold here much. i lost my big wool blanket from england in the divorce.

I rotate the sheets, freshly washed ones go on the bottom of the pile.

i lost half my sheets in the divorce as well, since my friendly ex-husband also prefers linen sheets. As an SCA member, he sews, makes historical clothing, and enjoys fine textiles too.

the 1000 dollar credit card purchase in my signature is this year's sheets purchased and custom made for me by fergusons this past september. they make all the linens to order. highly recomended.

and no, for me, anyway, real linen sheets do not last a lifetime. i get about 10 years out of them before they get made into historical clothing or pillowcases.

the linen sheets purchased from ebay always turn out to disintegrate or a huge disappointment.

that ten year old sheet is really soft. chemise?