Tissues ⭢ Handkerchiefs
The first thing to go was tissues. I have been building a collection of handkerchiefs for years because I think they are beautiful and easy to use. You can buy handkerchiefs online, from general stores, and in my case, largely from antique and resale shops.
Some people are disgusted by the idea of handkerchiefs and you do have to be more aware of your behavior than when using paper tissues. I always have a bag in my purse for my soiled hankies, and you need a rather large collection to make using them feasible. You also need to wash your hands after you blow your nose, but you should be doing that anyway.
When laundering them, they are more delicate than lots of other household cloths, and of course, they are full of your dried snot (look, we’re all thinking it). I have found that mine last longer if they are presoaked, and then washed in a mesh bag along with the rest of my laundry.
To manage this at home, I have a small separate container that they go into by my washing machine (which is conveniently located in my kitchen) and then I can soak and toss things in whenever I do a load of laundry.
You can’t dry them in the mesh bag as you end up with a bunch of crumpled nonsense but I hang most of my small items to dry anyway, so I just do that. Alternatively you can dry them with other laundry by dumping them out of the bag. You will need to fold them after that. The one thing that is absolutely true about replacing disposable items with cloth ones is that there will be a LOT of folding. You get used to it.




Love these ideas - used to have a collection of handkerchiefs from my grandmother, but they've been lost over the years and the moves.
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