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I love hanging laundry up on a line to dry. For the extra time it might take, standing out there in the open air, feeling the breeze on your face and hearing the birds sing is definitely worth it in my book! Besides, can anything beat the fresh smell of line-dried laundry?

–Chantel Brankshire in “Eight Simple Ways to Live Green” on ylcf.org

Mrs. Hood always teased me because Laddie had gone racing after her when I was born. She was in the middle of Monday’s washing, and the bluing settled in the rinse water and stained her white clothes in streaks it took months to bleach out.
-Gene Stratton Porter in Laddie

My grandmother remembers regular airings of the bedding – coming home from school to find her father had thrown all of the 10 children’s mattresses out of the upstairs windows to be beaten and aired on the bushes and clotheslines.
-Trina Holden in “Spring Cleaning, Dutch Style” on trinaholden.com

"Mother gets het up on her washing day," said Edith as she and Mary crossed the green to the church.
-Elizabeth Goudge in Scent of Water, page 262

Nancy Ellen so appreciated herself in pink that the extreme care she used with that dress saved it from half the trips of a dirt-brown one to the wash board and the ironing table…
-Gene Stratton Porter in Daughter of the Land

“In the center of the barge…was strung a washing line from which brightly colored female undergarments fluttered out over what was apparently a vegetable garden planted in the stern of the boat.”
-Elisabeth Goudge in Pilgrim’s Inn

As a general rule, the way you hang your clothes is the way they will dry. Fold sheets in half, then pin the open edges to the line, with the fold hanging down. Hang shirts by the hem, unless it’s very windy. In that case, or if you don’t have enough room on your clothesline, hang them by the collars. Hang jeans and skirts by the waist. Hang socks by the toe end–they dry fastest this way. Dishtowels can be folded in half vertically to save line space, if necessary. One other rule I always follow: hang delicate items somewhere on the line where they will not be immediately obvious to the passing world.

Hanging things in this way will allow the wind to shake the wrinkles right out of the clothes, leaving them soft and smooth. The sheets will already be folded in half, the shirts won’t need ironing, and if you fold things as you take them down, they won’t get wrinkled in the basket!

-Ruth Wiechmann in “Hanging Out the Washing (part two)” at ylcf.org

Ordinarily she loved going down to the village, there were so many interesting things to see: but today Mrs. Carter Flagg’s fascinating clothesline, with all those lovely quilts on it, did not win a glance from Rilla…
-L.M. Montgomery in Rilla of Ingleside

The smell? Well, it’ll make your labors all worthwhile. Your clothes will smell of spring air, of summer sunshine, of fall frosts. These beat any scented dryer sheets or fabric freshener all hollow. There’s nothing quite like crawling into a bed newly made up with clean sheets that smell like a prairie wind.

-Ruth Wiechmann in “Hanging Out the Washing (part two)” at ylcf.org

 

The clothesline strings across the back walk. Droplets reel out, a jeweled necklace, framing now. From one forgotten clothespin hangs a singular raindrop. And I see: the clothesline is the beam, the wooden clothespin an upright post. I see a cross in the clothespin.
-Ann Voskamp in One Thousand Gifts, quoted at aholyexperience.com

“She hastily emptied the little cotton frocks and aprons she had been washing out of the big wicker washing basket, hung them up…”
-Elizabeth Goudge in Smoky House, page 225

Emmeline and Hank’s sister were out hanging up clothes. Emmeline’s mouth was full of clothespins, and her brow was dark, for Hank’s sister talked much and worked slowly.
-Grace Livingston Hill in Phoebe Deane

Martha snapped the last curtain out of the basket and pinned it firmly on the line.
-Grace Livingston Hill in Miss Lavinia’s Call