I Swear By This Dish Washing Trick My Mom Taught Me as a Kid (She’s Been Doing It for Over 40 Years!)

I have vivid memories of sitting on the floor of my childhood home watching my mom wash dishes by hand. (To this day, my parents still don’t own a dishwasher.) I never knew how she did it; my mom juggled two rowdy kids and a full-time job as an overnight nurse. How did she have the energy to not just cook dinner, but also clean a mountain of dishes every single night? That was until recently, when it finally clicked. 

As I was washing some dishes by hand after dinner one night, I looked down into my sink. In it, just like my mom’s sink, was a bowl of ready-to-go, warm soapy water, complete with a sponge. Because it’s already sudsy, all you need to do is scrub your dish, then dip the sponge back in the bowl before washing your next item. My mom’s clever trick — which she’s been doing for over 40 years! — makes washing dishes so much faster and easier. You don’t need to constantly keep putting soap on a sponge or to fill up an entire sink with soapy water. 

Nowadays I have a dishwasher, yet I still do the same because, between the two kids, two cats, and a full-time job, the dishwasher is often overloaded — and every little bit helps when you’re just trying to get through the day.