Recovering the Lost Art of Hand Dishwashing (Tips for When Your Dishwasher is Broken)
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In case you hadn’t heard, our dishwasher broke three weeks ago. I didn’t realize what a vital member of the household it was until it broke. I know, a dishwasher is a luxury. Our pioneer mothers lived quite productive lives without them. Our sisters in other countries regularly experience dishpan hands. I didn’t know how good I had it.
Believe it or not, the last three weeks have not been a crisis. In fact, I’ve discovered lots of ways to thrive despite the fact that I must wash dishes at least three times a day. For all you peeps without an automatic dishwasher, hearken unto the voice of my cry:
- Wash as you go. Whatever you do, do not let the dishes pile up. Do not pass go; do not collect $200. If the meal is over, wash up. If the snack is over, wash up. It isn’t going to get easier. Trust me.
- Put them away right away. The secret of the dishwasher is that it hides your dishes, whether clean or dirty. Don’t let the grass grow under your feet. Deal with the dishes right away.
- Get good soap. I prefer Dawn. We’ve tried other bargain brands, truly we have. This is not an infomercial. Dawn really does cut grease out of the way.
- Wear gloves. This is absolutely necessary, especially in winter. I pick up several packages on sale at Walgreens, usually 3/$1, and stash them until I need a new pair.
- Use the racks from the dishwasher! Normally, we load the dishwasher with cups, plates, and flatware and then handwash pots and pans. We have a small countertop drying rack for this purpose. However, we quickly outgrew this drying rack once we started handwashing complete dinner sets for 8+ people. (The dishwasher broke prior to our Kansas friends coming for a visit.) What a brilliant idea to use the dishwasher racks to dry dishes. I’m hoping that when the new machine is installed tomorrow, that they’ll let me keep one of these mammoth drying racks.
- Limit your children to one cup per person. I told you how my children are all color coded? Well, I hid all their extra cups after a few days of washing 20 cups per day. They each get one cup – ONE. And this has worked amazingly well. I already told them they’re not getting the extra cups back!
- Teach your kids to wash dishes. I learned to wash dishes when I was seven, but recently realized that NONE of my children knew how to handwash dishes. This has proven to be a wonderful bonding experience – a silver lining, if you will, to the stormy cloud. One night while washing and rinsing with FishBoy7, he struck up the most amazing conversation:
FB: Mama, what was your best part of the day?
Mama: Our talk during dinner tonight. I loved your answers to my questions. I could tell you were thinking about them carefully. {continues washing dishes}
FB: Aren’t you going to ask me the best part of my day?
Mama: Oh, yes, what was the best part of your day?
FB: Right now. Washing dishes with you.
Be still my heart. Handwashing with my boy certainly works for me, even if the dishwasher doesn’t.
With 15 children in our family the one cup rule has to apply. We installed a narrow shelf and labeled it with names, now we don’t have people saying they can not find their cup etc. This also helps in keeping the house appear cleaner and not having dirty cups everywhere. Also only using one cup each has made it that we only need to run the dishwasher 1 time per day on school days. We always hand wash pots and pans as they are to big for the dishwasher.
Good tips!
I enjoyed this post! I wash my dishes by hand during the Christmas season due to using my Spode Christmas china. I do not want it to chip (which it does in the dishwasher). I decided to “enjoy” my china by using it for every meal from the day after Thanksgiving until Jan. 1. Thus, during the busiest time of my life, I am adding a huge chore to the list. Think this is awful? Actually, it’s not. It is my quiet time, my time to re-center myself, and my time to share highlights of my day with my family if they stay in the kitchen to help dry. Maybe our foremothers were smarter than we think!!
🙂 This made me smile! I hand washed dishes for 9 years, until we purchased our current home. My only request was that it had a dishwasher! 🙂 It has been almost 4 years that I’ve used the dishwasher and there are times where I find myself still hand washing dishes for the fun of it… silly, I know! 🙂 My favorite part is the great smelling soap… lavender, orange, apple, mountain mist… oh my! 🙂
Mine is broken too! These are great survival tips:-)
We got a dishwasher last year after 12 years of not having one, and I’m so well trained that I STILL “wash as I go”, even though I could just load those things into the dishwasher. But hey, more room for the multitudes of cups that I still haven’t been able to teach my daughters to limit to one per day!
I also second the gloves point. Don’t do what I did, kids, and wash gloveless. My hands look 20 years older than the rest of me.
My dishwasher has been threatening to die, for a long time. so I wash by hand and pretend it still works. I would use it occasionally but have gotten used to hand washing, and i always use it as a drying rack. My littles are learning life skills and dishes are next on the list. actually i was thinking that Dad needs in on this great “experience” too. Thanks for a great post
My dishwasher isn’t broken, but I periodically choose a week or two where we handwash all dishes. There are 11 of us at home, so that’s a LOT of dishes. Your number 1 trick is THE trick. Do them right away, and have a sibling or two dry and put them away.
I have used my dishwasher to let them air dry a bit too. Not with the rack out, just stuck them right in there!
I am an only child, and my job was to wash the supper dishes every night. I HATED it!!! Now, I don’t mind doing them at all! It’s a chance to stand still and think about all sorts of things. I like looking out the window over my sink while I wash.
All my kids down to the 8 yr old are currently trusted to wash…youngers can dry and put away.
Dawn
I use the “one cup” idea too… only not with plastic cups! I got so tired of my kids always bumping them over, until a friend gave me the idea to use mugs! So each kid now has their own mug… they haven’t knocked one over yet, and I don’t have to refill as often either! 🙂
Ah, the one cup rule. We have it at our house, but when I go visit Mom, somehow my cup always disappears. Any tips for training my mom not to wash my cup after every sip?
My cousin always puts a rubber band around her cup. She lets everyone know that cup is off limits to washing.