The process of switching from paper towels to cloth towels is working perfectly. I’m really excited about my tiny little contribution to the environment. There is one thing, however, that I think I need to share with everyone.
Unless you wash clothes fairly often, do not put the soiled cloth towels in the hamper with your regular clothes. You probably want a separate basket for the cloth towels.
My children have converted and are using the cloth towels regularly. They use them for every messy spill and then toss them in the hamper (sometimes sopping wet). If it’s not my normal washday, it may be a day or two before I sort and wash clothes. As a result the sopping wet cloth towels sit and ‘ferment’ in the hamper. You won’t believe how a few simple wet towels can wreak odoriferous havoc in a hamper.
At first I couldn’t pinpoint where the awful smell was coming from. I actually thought the septic had backed up. It wasn’t until I went to sort clothes that I was blindsided by the smell. Whew, even the dog kept his distance from the hamper (this from an animal that sleeps curled up with his nose firmly implanted in his rear end).
I still consider the switch from paper towels to cloth towels experiment a smashing success; it just needs a little tweaking.
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This is a question not a comment: I am striving to reduce my carbon footprint but have also recently been laid off. I find that most of my “green” practices also help save money but I am wondering if using cloth or paper would be cheaper. Clearly cloth is “greener” and I will keep that in mind but due to my situation I am looking for thrifty; any feedback?
PS-I am searching the world wide web for advice so I probably won’t be able to come back to this site to check for the response. I would greatly appreciate a response to my email.
I commend you in your effort to help the environment! We really should all do our part to conserve our resources. I actually use both paper and cloth, and am inspired to use all cloth, now that I’ve heard it could work! Greetings from http://www.rugsdoneright.com — the best priced area rugs and the widest selection.