Easy Peasy Tip: Use a Dish rag!
By tinychoices | August 28, 2010
Here’s an old fashioned tip – use a dish rag in the kitchen! Sponges are convenient and effective, but they’re also disposable and sometimes have lots of plastic involved. Even the eco-friendly sponges are still something that must be bought frequently.
So how about moving back to a tried and true technology that our grandparents used? Get some dish rags to use! you can make your own easily (especially if you crochet or knit) or buy them, and the key seems to be to have one that is not too big, because it will be overly swishy and in the way when you wash dishes. Have several on hand so you can use them for dirty jobs and chuck them in the wash pile when you’re done (and they’re dry).
And if you need an extra scrubby, try getting a stiff bristled scrub brush or how about repurposing those plastic mesh canvas bags?
Are you a dishcloth fan or foe?
[[Photo from flickr user doubledutchess via creative commons license.]]
Topics: Easy Peasy Tips, Home | 8 Comments »
Hi friend,
Thank you for the tips and I love it. The used cloth netting and the lifespan is also longer compare to sponge..
Love your blog…
You know, my mom never used a sponge, so I’ve never used one… A dishcloth works just fine, and I use Brillo pads when it’s particularly stubborn dirt! :)
My partner is very much against dish rags, because they tend to start smelling more quickly. But perhaps I could convince him with the environmental consideration – which, honestly, I’d not thought about either (It’s funny how these small things can slip past even the most die-hard ecofreaks). Perhaps if we cut our few dish rags in half, the smell problem will be addressed with more frequent changing and laundering.
Hi Carly,
My step mom uses dish rags and I was convinced that there was no way to keep them from smelling as her are ALWAYS rank. The big secret seems to be to always rinse and ring before hanging them over the sink to dry. Even in a dry area like El Paso ours can get smelly if we don’t rinse and ring them out. It took a while to convince my partner that he had the ability to cut down on the smell but we now can use the same one for several days without issue. I have also used the same three for ~5 years and while getting a little bit raggedy they are still usable. Think how much money I have save with this “Tiny Choice”!
I LOVE dishrags. I have used them for about 5 years now. I started when my first baby was little. They are so nice to use on little hands and faces and then on high chairs! I knit some of my own, collect some from craft fairs, and trade with other knitter friends!
They do smell fairly quickly, that’s why it’s a good idea to have a whole flock of dishrags ready. I wash them frequently (I have another baby, so there is no end to laundry).
Rather than eco-friendly, my thoughts range more towards the ick factor of what grows on sponges. I prefer the rags because they get washed regularly and don’t have time to grow their own science experiments.
Sooo… if I was to knit my own dishrags, would they have to be of cotton? Is acrylic an option?
My own beloved crocheted dish scrubbie pattern is revealed in the comments of this old post!
I first made them with cotton which wasn’t as great as my further versions made from thrifted and donated scratchy acrylic. Those are the ones still in rotation after a year, and they work just as well as the plastic scrubbies I used to be addicted to (because, well, they ARE plastic scrubbies…)
Be forewared, though: if you excitedly give them to friends to share the love, they may use them as coasters instead, because of their beauty. It happened to me, it could happen to you!
Thanks – I have some leftover acrylic, though it’s not super scratchy. And, I do need to learn how to crochet eventually…