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From least-often to most-often:

Coat: Have your coats professionally cleaned at the end of winter. Store with tissue paper lining the body and sleaves, and think about getting a cedar block on a hook to hang from the hanger inside the coat to keep the smell fresh until the following autumn. If you get a coat horribly splattered with something nasty, of course, have it cleaned then too.

Anything wool: Clean once every ten wearings if you haven't worn it to do something really stinky, like riding horses or going to a setting in which a lot of people are smoking. If you wear wool into that sort of environment, get it professionally cleaned immediately. This goes for sweaters, scarves, shawls, anything that's wool. Actually, it goes for anything that's dry-clean only, really.

Regular sweaters and sweatshirts: Once every 4-6 wearings, depending on how they smell to you when you're fresh from a shower. Sometimes we can't smell things if we're smelly ourselves, but once we're clean, something previously acceptable will make us go, "Ugh." If it does, clean it.

Trousers and skirts: Once every 3 wearings if you're sitting home at the computer. If you're getting outside or if you're doing housework, you're sweating more, so wash them every other wearing.

Bras: These are a special case. If it's summertime and/or you're doing hard physical activity, these can only be worn once, because you're sweating and stinking. If you sit at home, work in a quiet office, or it's cool enough that you don't sweat if you go outside and run an errand without deodorant on, you can wear a bra up to four times -- just air it out overnight. This also works with a thin camisole. Febreeze will also work in a pinch, but I hesitate to recommend it, given how it contributes to air pollution.

Shirts: If it's a stay-home day, you can wear a shirt twice, particularly if the second time is when you're staying home or going outside to do manual labor. If you wore an undershirt, you can get away with wearing the outer shirt twice, unless it looks visibly wrinkled or dirty. Undershirts, do the post-shower sniff test and decide.

Underpants, socks: Wear ONCE. Some days, you'll even have to change them after half the day has gone by, or if you've slept fitfully (exercised in your sleep, that is, sweated at night).

Bath: Bath towels should be washed weekly, while hand/face towels need to be changed about every three days. Washcloths collect a lot of bacteria -- you use them, then rinse lightly and leave it wet and use it again and again -- so this should be changed after EVERY usage. That's right, I wash my face in the morning and toss that cloth, then bathe and toss that one too. Two washcloths per person per day.

Kitchen: Kitchen towels should be washed, obviously, if you get something on them. Also, if they feel damp after you've hung them to dry for a couple of hours and then go back to the kitchen, toss them. Dish rags should be changed after every use, just like facial wash cloths. Dish sponges collect a lot of bacteria and shouldn't be used at all, but if you must, change them AT LEAST once per week. Steel wool can be replaced when it starts to look like "Hey, is that a little bit of rust right there?" Plastic 'steel' wool should be discarded any time you see debris in it after rinsing. Even if you don't see debris, discard the plastic scrubbie about once every ten to fourteen days.

"Underpants, socks: Wear ONCE. Some days, you'll even have to change them after half the day has gone by, or if you've slept fitfully (exercised in your sleep, that is, sweated at night)."

Oh man...
Who the * sleeps in their socks?

In the winter, I do. My feet get cold and without socks they take forever to warm up and I can't get to sleep until they do. I have some pairs of special fuzzy sleep socks just for sleeping. They're not the same socks that were worn all day.

If you are going to sleep with socks and they are the ones you wear during the day, make sure they're fresh, clean, and dry when you go to bed. The ones that were worn all day are damp and will make your feet colder.

My feet FREEZE in any temperature less then 90 F. So socks are a nightly requirement except in the middle of summer.

Well, see, that's why I have a duvet that I tuck just a little bit under my toes. Learned that from having cats around me while growing up ofcourse, only way to make the toes safe from payful kitties too.


Um, the cold mutates. Constantly. Why do you think there's no cure? So, yeah, you got that nasty cold last year, but when you get it again this winter, it's not the same cold.

So is mine. sweatdrop Ill ask him for 3 days (after Ive done the wash & once again saw non of his) to bring me the diry ones befor he turns around & askes were his clean cloths are. confused How can I wash them if I dont get them. (hes 14 & old enuff to wash them himself if he misses wash day)

Everyone has their smelly spot. (Mine are my feet... xp )

And yet, people who have had the cold last winter and their bodies has built up antigens, are MUCH better prepared for dealing with this year's cold.
Both the cold and the flu are constantly mutating yes, but both diseases follow a pattern, and if you get the cold and the flu, your bodies resistance to the diseases goes up, and so you get less sick when the next version comes by.