Save Money: 5 Easy Steps to a Paperless Kitchen
One easy way to save money in your household is to cut down (or cut out completely) all the paper goods that you use in your home. Here are a few tips to help you make than transition smoothly.
Use What You Have
Lots of items you already have can be recycled to use as cleaning rags. My favorites are old t-shirts and socks with holes. I use these to dust the open shelves in my kitchen, clean windows and wipe up spills. I also take old and worn out washcloths from the linen closet and add them to the rag pile.
Go Thrifting
Thrift stores and yard sales are a great resource for cloth napkins and hand towels. If you find a nice matching set you can save it for special guests and use your non-matching napkins for the family. You may also find old towels and cheap t-shirts for super low prices which are great for cleaning.
Make Cloth Substitutes Convenient
Store your clean rags, towels, washcloths and napkins in a convenient place and let everyone know where they are. We have ours in a drawer right next to the kitchen sink which makes it really easy to grab a cloth alternative to dry hands and wipe up spills.
Make Paper Towels Disappear
I still keep paper towels around for things like spilled oil or for clean up when someone is sick, but by making them less accessible we only go through a roll every 2 or 3 months. If the paper towels are difficult to find, your family will be less likely to use them.
Change Daily
The key to safely using non-disposable items (especially in the kitchen) is to have enough on hand that you can use a new towel, dishcloth and/or rag every day. You will also need a convenient place to stash the dirty towels and rags which can start to smell after about a week.
I have a dishpan in the cabinet above my washing machine where I store the used cloth items. I spread out any wet items on the side of the dish pan and then add them to the pile in the center of the dishpan once they are dry. Once every ten days or so, I wash everything so our supply never dwindles.
If you want to try a fantastic paper towel substitute a friend told me about Skoy Eco-friendly Cleaning Cloths which are thin sponges that dry very quickly and are awesome for cleaning large surfaces and soaking up spills.
They are also relatively inexpensive and hold up well after multiple washes. My friend washes them in her washing machine and then microwaves them for a couple of minutes to fully kill any lingering bacteria.
Click here to find Skoy cloths on Amazon.
Have you gone paperless? Share your tips in the comments.
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photo credit: franky242; freedigitalphotos.net
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Everyone can keep up with their napkins as well. 🙂
I went paperless years ago. If you sew then making cloth napkins are so easy. I love setting a table with them and most of the time I use different ones per person….I hate to match my dishes don’t match so you see I love whimsy!
We have been using cloth napkins for some time. I like the way they feel. We have a older dog and sometimes he misses his pad in the laundry room, so I have all my old washcloths and old stained dishcloths on a shelf and use them to clean up after him. I rinse them out in the mop sink and lay over the side to dry. When I have a few I run a small load of just those, hot water a little oxyclean and they are ready to go again.
Thanks for taking the time to comment Sara. I am sure that using rags rather than paper towels saves you lots of money!
I buy cheap washcloths and keep an assortment of them, I use lots of dark ones so stains don’t show. I put them in a basket by the kitchen table and we use them for napkins. They are great for kids since you can get them wet as needed. I put them in the laundry and wash with other clothes so it doesn’t add much, if at all for laundry. Saves a lot in buying paper napkins. I have three grown sons and we still do it now. They are great. Kohl’s often have great washcloth sales on the day after Thanksgiving and I stock up.
That is a great idea Carol – thanks!
This is something I’d love to hear other readers comments on, because I’ve wondered about this for a long time. I wonder if replacing paper napkins with cloth ones really saves you money in the long run by the time you have to wash the cloth ones? I’d love others thoughts or experiences? I think cloth napkins are pretty, but NEVER use them….. would love suggestions. Thanks!
I have not done any calculations Tina, but I am washing towels and washcloths anyway so adding the cloth napkins to the load once every 10 days doesn’t add any cost as far as doing the laundry is concerned. Just my thoughts.
I keep my clean rags and towels under the sink. I also keep a tiny laundry basket (from the dollar tree) under there for the dirty/wet ones. Fills up quickly but makes it easy to throw in the load. I keep pretty cloth napkins my mother in law made me by our table and my kids know to grab one and when done put it up by the sink.
That is smart to keep a small laundry basket under the sink Jerilyn. Great idea!