My Indoor Clothesline
Can you guess what’s behind this curtain? I love that you’d never know if I didn’t tell you.
This is where I hang stuff when it’s freezing or raining outside. I got this retractable clothesline for Christmas. And I absolutely love it.
It just attaches to the wall, and can be retracted back out of the way, if needed. Don’t you just love the cute clothes pin bag?
The spray shower head (also good for spraying cloth diapers in the potty) hangs between the clothes lines.
I haven’t tried hanging anything heavy on the line. I have an expandable floor dryer I drape jeans and blankets over to dry. Cloth diapers, t-shirts, and any other lightweight materials hang here perfectly though.
It’s so nice having an indoor clothes line that can easily be hidden! And with the drips falling into the bathtub, there’s no mess on the floor to worry about.
That is really neat. I like the hidden aspect of it. But I am wondering if you have enough heat or dry air in there to dry those diapers and things like that. Our bathroom wouldn’t work. It’s too humid in there most of the time. I hang stuff on my front porch all the time. I have wheels with clothespins on them for all the small stuff. And I hang stuff near my wood-stove. I don’t have a dryer, so some days I have to get creative.
Kendra, that is SO NEAT! After our $72,000,000 electric bill came in the mail yesterday (give or take a few zeros) I’ve determined that I NEED to do more to help us save money on that bill. Giving the dryer a rest is one of those things. I love your solution, and may possibly employ it myself!
Tancy,
I know what you mean. Our master bathroom is too humid. But the kids’ bathroom is perfect. Maybe ’cause they don’t take showers in there, and there is a heat/air vent (there isn’t one in the master bath). But yeah, it only takes about half a day for stuff to dry here
Cool idea!! With our kids all older and all of us taking showers, our bathrooms wouldn’t really work for that…but, we’re fortunate enough to have a large mud/laundry room in our current house, so I have about three of the huge, heavy duty, old-fashioned wooden drying racks that I’ve picked up at garage sales and auctions. I keep at least two set up in the laundry room all the time, and open up the third as needed. I put loads in the dryer for about five minutes (most things just on “fluff” rather than a heated cycle, since about 80% of the electricity the dryer uses is for the heating element)to shake out wrinkles and take out stiffness, then hang them to dry. They dry faster than ever with the drier wood heat from the wood stove. Works great!
P.S. I used to hang clothes outside, at least in the warm weather, but mine and my son’s pollen allergies reached the point where we just can’t do that anymore…wet clothes are a pollen magnet. I miss the smell of clothes dried out in the sun, though! The sun is also a good natural whitener and odor-remover for clothes. You can hang out a sleeping bag that reeks of campfire smoke, and after a whole day out in the hot sun, the smell is totally gone.
Pam W.,
Actually, you could still use this setup in your shower. Since it is retractable, you could just pull it in and out as you need it, in between showering
Sounds like you already have a nice system going for you though! I wish I had the space in my laundry room to have more clothes drying racks. We can hardly squeeze from the backdoor through the laundry room and into the main living area as it is!! Still working on small space solutions for that area.
What a great idea! I’ve been complaining of dry air because of the wood stove, but having this in the bathroom might work! We all take our showers in the morning, so when I’m home in the afternoon, I can hang clothes there! It’s too cold to hang them outside without turning into an icicle myself. I’m impressed!
Yes, I was wondering about moisture, too. Does your bathroom have a fan for when you are showering, and such? Ours doesn’t and the steam feels as though it “hangs around” all day sometimes in there. Any suggestions?
Charla,
It’s not good to let the bathroom stay so humid. The moisture can accumulate on the walls and in crevices, and even behind the walls and mold can build up and make you sick. If there is a window in there, open it occasionally to vent the room. Leave the door open too. The bathroom that I have the line in doesn’t have a fan, or a window, but like I said, we don’t use it for showers, and the kids take baths about twice a week, so there isn’t a lot of moisture hanging around. Plus, we leave the door open, and there is an air vent in there, so that helps.
I was just thinking about this the other day when I put my cloth diapers over my shower curtain bar and over the side of the bathtub and thought “I need a better system!” I love this! We live in a very small apartment and I really don’t want to hang my cloth diapers out to freeze in the winter!! Thank you so much!
I have a retractable clothesline at our old house. We are in the process of moving right now. It runs from the back porch to the garage. In our new house I think I’ll end up putting it in the bathroom. Unless I can get someone to set posts in the back yard for me. Or, maybe I can get a smaller version, like yours for the bathroom.
Love it! Where would I find myself one?
Stacey,
This one was from Amazon. Right now its $24.31 w/ about $7 shipping. Save your Swagbucks for it!!
Fantastic idea! I love it.
When I lived in Maine it was cold , a lot. So my husband hooked up a pully system outside a sliding window for me. the line made a loop between 2 pully’s . I could open the window, hang my clothes and pull the line around to hang more. then close the window. It was wonderful. I didn’t trudge through the snow to hang the clothes. They would freeze and get stiff. You knew they were dry when they flowed in the breeze no longer stiff. The house we are in now isn’t located in such a way to do this again so I use a wooden rack for drying clothes. Shirts I hang on a hanger and hang them around the house. When they are dry they are on a hanger ready for the closet. Maybe this idea will help make someone else’s life easier.
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