housecleaning tip of the day

...because I do so much housecleaning I know these things (or even this thing.)

HOW TO GET BEAUTIFULLY PRESSED TABLECLOTHS WITH NO IRONING!

1. Wash tablecloth (but not as the label suggests, on gentle cycle, 'cause that never gets out the catsup spilled by the children.)

2. Hang wet tablecloth over clothesline strung in the basement for cold/wet weather. The weight of the cloth will pull out any wrinkles.

3. (this is the important one.) Leave now-dried tablecloth hanging in basement for the next week or so, walking through it to hang up other clothes forbidden the dryer. (hey, I hate it when my cottons shrink.) Rant repeatedly at children for trying to use the CLEAN tablecloth as a tent. "Can you even fathom all the work I do?" martyr line can be used with...no effect at all, because the kids have already tumbled to the fact that mom has lost it.

4. Whisk tablecloth from the line up the stairs and onto the table without crushing/wrinkling it minutes before guests are due to arrive and...Voila! ( I sooo need a keyboard with French accent marks) No pesky fold lines or those superstition-provoking death omen diamonds!

Do you think Martha Stewart might have a place for me...in a bed with clean, ironed (hey, it's Martha) flannel sheets where the door can be locked and the room is sound-proofed from little boys who need to tell one about the circumference of a banana slug at 7:30 AM, husbands who love their screechy birds and must provoke said screechiness at 7:40 AM, then remonstrate loudly with their preteen daughters about wastage of cereal products at 8:05 AM? She could even patronizingly show me how to make a wreath with nothing but a glue gun, some trash bags and fake flowers if she'd harbor me from the morning-loving aliens with whom I live.

I could spin out quite the fantasy, but I have to go to bed, so I can get up and wash/change its sheets tomorrow. But at least I won't have to fold or iron them!