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When you’re off on your own for the first time, you’ll find that you have a lot of new responsibilities. One of these is handling your own laundry, which may seem simple, but has several steps involved. The guide below offers tips for how to help your clothes look their best so that you can, too.

Do:

Separate lights and darks.

Mixing colors can cause the dyes to bleed into each other. Therefore, separate items into darks and lights, with a third category for delicates, which will need special care or they risk snagging. Use warm water with your light colored clothes and cold water for the darker ones. Always use the gentle cycle with delicates.

Check the tags.

While the laundry symbols on your tags may be confusing to understand, there are online guides that can help. Deciphering them allows you to then care for the garment in the way it was intended, avoiding unwanted damage. For example, they may tell you whether the item requires a tumble dry or cold water only.

Clean the lint trap.

The drying cycle naturally helps your clothes shed extra pieces of fuzz so that they come out nice and soft. This debris then collects in the lint trap. However, if you don’t regularly clear it out, it will impact airflow, causing your clothes to dry slower. It is also a potential fire hazard.

Don’t:

Overload the machine.laundry

Only fill your machines to the halfway point. While this might mean increasing the number of loads you do, this extra space is necessary so that your garments can move around enough to be properly cleaned.

Forget your bleeding test.

When you get new clothing, don’t just throw it in with a normal load. Place it in a bin of cold water and leave it for 30 minutes. If the water has changed color when you return, then the piece is bleeding dye and could ruin your other laundry if washed together, so clean it separately for now. 

Put detergent directly on the clothes.

Putting detergent directly on the clothes can bleach them of color and will impact the washer’s ability to clean the rest of the items in the load. Instead, use the detergent box located at the top of the washer if there is one. If there isn’t, then let the washer fill up with water before pouring the detergent in.

 

City Laundry in Lincoln, NE, makes washing your clothes easy and affordable. This coin laundromat features large capacity machines and is open 365 days a year for your convenience. Learn more helpful tips like these on their website or call (402) 483-2113 to ask a friendly staff member any questions you have.

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