Buying, Caring for and Storing Fitted Sheets

Fitted sheets, also called bottom sheets, can be a major chore to deal with. If you don’t buy the right size, they will not stay on your bed. You end up waking up in an uncomfortable, twisted and tangled pile in the morning, struggling to find your way back out if they are too small. If they are too big, on the other hand, you end up with wrinkles that seem to work their way to your sensitive lower back, each and every night.

Keeping them on the bed is only part of the problem of course. Once they are off the bed, you have to fold and then put these things away. The problem with fitted sheets is that they are not square. There are some people that can grab the corners and whip them right into a neatly folded packet. Others are still standing with their sheets in hand, trying to figure out how to just store them all on the bed and be done with it. There are some tricks to storing your sheets so that they are neat and tidy and ready to go whenever it is bed changing day.

First thing: buy the right size. If you have a pillow top bed, an extra thick mattress or have added other padding of any kind to your mattress, you need to look for a set of sheets that says “deep pockets.” That way, it will accommodate the extra depth of the mattress without popping off all of the time. Look for material that will not shrink and always follow the care instructions carefully when you wash them.

After the sheets are washed and dried, you can fold them, trying to keep the creases and lines to a bare minimum. To keep sets together and organized, you can put them into one of the pillow cases, which keeps you from having to search through the linen closet for the matches to whatever you are putting on the bed. It also means that if your sheet is not folded perfectly, it will not matter.

Certain materials will stay on the bed and perform better than others do. Satin sheets are notorious for popping or sliding off and look romantic on television but can be a struggle at home. Cotton, especially brushed cotton is soft, stretchable and can be one of the best materials that you have worked with. Minimizing the number of sheet sets that you have can reduce your work. If you only have one or two sets, then you just wash one set and put the other on the bed and then rotate. Whether you have two or ten, fitted sheets are only a pain if you let them be.