Fifty Shades of Grey Trousers

I’ve often wondered what there is at the bottom of my laundry basket. I’m not sure, you see – I haven’t seen it for a very long time. It is not entirely impossible that underneath the never-ending pile of things to be washed, there might be the Ark of the Covenant, the Missing Link, or a worm-hole to Mars. Maybe I might even find that missing blue top of mine I haven’t seen for months.

Dealing with ‘the laundry’ is my least favourite of domestic chores. It’s the relentlessness that kills me. Wash, dry, iron, fold. Wash, dry, iron, fold. It’s like white noise. While there might be some small degree of satisfaction to be reached when the clothes are all fluttering away on the line on a rare, ‘good drying day’ (do people still say that?), the joy is short-lived. But by the time those same clothes are dry, there is twice the amount in the laundry basket.

Even when you're ready for Big School, teddy still needs a wash!

During the summer holidays there somehow seems to be even more washing. Does it breed under conditions of excess moisture, I wonder? The boys seem to somehow manage to go through several different outfits a day – swapping out of the winter clothes they dressed in when it was lashing rain in the morning, to shorts and t-shirts in the afternoon as the sun finally makes an appearance and back into different joggers to go and kick the ball on the green in the evening when it’s drizzling again. Drips from ice-lollies, suncream stains, sticky marks, grass-stains, mud … it may sound like an advert for washing powder but these things really happen!

Of course, in a few weeks, we’ll be back to school (hurray!) and then there will be the additional factor of ironing (booo). You see, I don’t really believe in ironing - especially not shorts and t-shirts, and especially not when the Olympics are on - but you can’t really get away without ironing the school clothes can you. Can you?

Well, maybe you can.  Did you know, for example, that the Tesco school uniform range comes with shirts and polo shirts which are easy-iron and trousers which are stain resistant and non-iron.  This has to be good news - unless, of course, you happen to be an iron.

I will admit to being more than a little sceptical about these ironing claims, but after putting the clothes to the test in a strict scientific environment (i.e. throwing everything into the washing machine and putting the kettle on), I can happily say that the trousers didn’t need ironing at all and the shirts only took a couple of minutes (you only see the collar, right?!).

Whatever your personal ‘domestic goddess’ ranking, I suspect that many children across the country will never look smarter than on the first day of school. Washed, ironed and preened to perfection they will look fabulous – and us mammies will proudly take endless photos. After that? Well, I’m sure it will be a slippery slope towards Christmas when the cracks in the domestic facade begin to show and tolerance levels for ironing creases into grey trousers begin to wane. No doubt, come next June, our children will be walking out of school with half-mast trousers, scuffed shoes, worn patches on the knees and a shirt which hasn’t seen an iron since Easter. But with a little bit of Tesco’s help, there’s always hope…

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Fifty Shades of Grey Trousers