Laundry loot

It's amazing what a mom will find in her laundry when responsible for washing the clothes for a family of five. Most weeks, I can do the laundry without any fun surprises but everyone once in a while I get blessed with little extra goodies that are sometimes shocking, sometimes funny and sometimes ridiculous.

Now these items are never found early in the dirty clothes basket or pile for that matter, oh no, but rather AFTER they've been washed or sometimes even after they've been both washed AND dried. I'm sure all households occasionally hear a rattle in the dryer and then try to guess what could be making such a racket. Well, in our house, I've washed and dried the same pocket knife of Hubby's so many times now, that I can identify that particular knife by the type of banging it makes in the dryer without even looking. Someone else in our house may think its buttons on the jeans, or a rock, but nope, I know. Hubby left his stinkin' knife on his jeans again. How the wood on that knife is still intact, I'll never know?

Since I have three girls, I've washed more bobbi pins than I can even count, as well as little miniature hair clips and dozens of ponytail holders. That's just a normal week of laundry there. So what I'm referring to is the rare laundry appearances. For instance, yesterday, when I was switching the wet clothes to the dryer, out popped a black permanent marker. A PERMANENT MARKER!! WASHED WITH OUR GOOD CLOTHES!! Are you kidding me?? As it fell onto the floor, it was like slow motion, my eyes seeing it and then my mind quickly thinking of all the damage it must have caused. I breathed a sigh of relief, however, when I saw the cap, securely on the marker and noticed the wet clothes in my hands had no obvious black streaks on them. Let me just say that someone in my house just dodged a bullet and a WHOLE ton of trouble, thanks to that blasted cap being on that marker. I've washed many a pen, with little effects, but a marker? That would have been disastrous!

Anyway, I use to think washing a drill bit was weird until I washed about 22 of them. And how about the time I washed and dried an entire pack of gum? Amazingly, none of it got loose and wreaked havoc, thank goodness! Same was true with the 4 or 5 tubes of chapstick that made it through a whole laundry adventure without melting all over the clothes.

Ruined the chapstick but saved the shirts. The list is long in my house, for odd things to wash. I've washed toys, rocks, money, earrings, necklaces, sticky notes, tickets, and several small sticks. Yep, actual sticks. My kids carry a lot of interesting things in the jacket pockets and then fail to remove them before hitting the dirty clothes basket. Last week I even washed some sea shells.

Yup, just never know what I might find in my laundry loot!