Thank you all for your comments of your laundering process. It should just be fair that I tell you what I do...
When I first started knitting socks, I wondered how often do I wash these socks? Do I wash them after every wearing like the socks I buy from the stores? After some googling, I found a few sites that mentioned that wool socks need not be washed after each wearing. Being the lazy person I am, I thought it's cool! So I wear my socks at least twice, maybe 4 times max. I don't walk around a lot, being my job is a desk job - I walk to get water, bathrooms, cafetaria, printer (10 feet away). Back and forth to the parking lot.. That's it. On weekends, it's a different story - it depends if I go out. If not, I tend to be bare-footed (even in winter and my house is cold - don't ask me why). When I take them off in the bathroom, they are drapped over the bath tub to air out.
When it's time to wash socks, I select 5 of the same color family. I go through all the worn socks (I have over 100 pairs now) and at any time, I could have from 6 - 20 pairs that may need washing. On the iffy ones, I smell the leg to see if I can still smell the Eucalan or Soak. And so the 5 lucky ones get a bath for anywhere from 3 - 24 hours!
This is a Rubbermaid dishpan. I use about 1 tsp of Soak or Eucalan - the full size bottle lasts me a year.
After the bath, they go to the washing machine for a spin. I do squeeze out gently the water before throwing them in the machine. Before spin:
After spin:
After the spin, they're about 50% dry. They get blocked. I have 5 pairs of sock blockers - that's why I wash 5 pairs at a time.
I put them back on the dishpan:
and set it near the heat vent. They dry by the next day, being it's dry here in Minnesota in the winter.
and that's how I wash my socks!
I already have photos of the mannequin. I will talk about her in my next post - which I hope to post in the next day or two.
