If you thought kids got dirty exploring at home all summer, just wait til they’re on vacation. You’ve got your laundry hamper full after baseball practice, sidewalk chalking, finger painting, frog hunting, sandbox digging, football tossing, and more. But when you on vacation? On vacation it gets even filthier.
And the best part about having filthy kids, means you’ve been doing summer right. When they’re outside, they get dirty, and that’s a win.
So here’s a TIL: when scheduling your road tripping itinerary, don’t pack every day full of activities. Book some spare time for laundry. Seriously.
On our recent escape to Idaho, my wife started dropping hints about wanting to do laundry on Day 2.
Me? I’m fine wearing things twice, packing only one pair of pyjamas for a complete week but her? She was starting to talk about doing laundry on day 2.
We ran the Color Run at Schweitzer Mountain, we were buried in corn starchy powder and trail dust.
The boys were digging in the mud and sand on the shores of Lake Pend Oreille 
It doesn’t take long on vacation to get filthy, and Jen was getting antsy about wanting to get things clean. “I do laundry every other day,” she remarked. It was something I hadn’t realized – laundry isnt in my list of activities for around the home – she’s constantly doing laundry. Every other day there’s a load she needs to get clean.
Has it become an obsession? Is it a compulsive habit? Whatever it was, it trailed over to our vacation, and by day 4 we were scrounging through the car looking for quarters to plug the machines in the basement of our hotel. To do laundry on vacation.
Do you plan for laundry time when you’re summer road tripping?