How to save time doing the dishes

Let’s face it, doing dishes is a chore, even when we have a dishwasher.  Want to cut down on the amount of time it takes to do dishes?  Here are some tips…

• Empty your dishwasher as soon as the dishes are dry.  It is far easier to load an empty dishwasher as you go, then to simply dump them in the sink for three days because no one has emptied out the clean dishes yet.
• Making a recipe that calls for multiple measuring spoons and cups, a cutting board for veggies as well as one for meat, not to mention the various pots and pans you are cooking it all in?  As long as you won’t trip over the door, leave the dishwasher open, and pop each item you use immediately into the dishwasher, rather than putting them all in the sink first.
• Are your kids starting to get better at putting dishes in the dishwasher, but you have discovered that dirty plate from the spaghetti dinner in the dishwasher among the clean dishes? Use some of the kid’s alphabet magnets, one D and one C.  Then if the dishes are dirty, put the D on the front of the door, and when you start the dishwasher, swap out the D for the C.
• Divide up the utensils before you put them in the dishwasher.  So all the knives are in one section, the forks in the other, etc.  Just be careful when you put the spoons in that they don’t all “spoon” each other.
• Run the dishwasher at night, so you won’t heat up your house in the summer, and so you can keep filling it up right up til bedtime, so that last glass can be put in it.

By following these tips, you can help make the whole doing dishes chore less of a chore.  Oh, and it doesn’t hurt to assign the emptying of the dishwasher to one of your kids 😉