UNpaper towels

Ok, I am not a "green" person. I get it, we need to save the environment, yadda, yadda... I care but it's not my calling. What IS my calling is saving money. We're on a cheap, tiny budget. Couponing, to me, is more than clipping coupons and taking them to the store. It also encompasses finding frugal living solutions. UNpaper towels are my first major household change toward spending less money on products that we can do without.

I found an excellent tutorial on this blog.... Cotton Tail Babies ... She tells you all the details so I recommend reading that tutorial before getting started.

You'll need some fleece and some terry cloth, one for the cute side and the other for the absorbent side. If you have some old terry cloth towels or a robe that you can slice up, I'd recommend using that because this material was 9.99/yard at our local fabric store. Yikes!

1 yard of fabric yeilds 9 towels. This is what I made to start. I'll let you know if I feel like this is enough or not once we've really gotten used to using them for everything.

Here's my towel during the sewing process:

I don't like sewing, in particular. I am a lazy crafter. I don't like to pin, I didn't like that the tutorial said to sew the pieces together then sew on the outside again.. sounded like a lot of work. BUT! It wasn't so bad! The second set of sewing, on the top-side of the fabric is really necessary so they lay flat and look nice.

I purchased plastic snaps at the fabric store, in the cloth diaper section. Check out all the colors available!

They were super easy to attach and I found a color that matched my pattern perfectly! The metal snaps are easier to find (available at Walmart) but I wanted to be able to microwave these UNpaper towels if need be- like when covering a dish of beets, lest it explode all over my microwave. And they'll probably lay around all wet and soggy for a while until I wash them. Metal would rust under the care that I'll likely provide.

Here's my final product, I am so happy with the outcome!

I took an old paper towel roll, covered it with a scrap of my flannel using hot glue, then added 2 snaps to that roll. This provided the stability they needed to stand up well on the counter.

These would make an excellent gift or craft fair item!

The last thing I need to do is mount a basket on the wall above the garbage where soiled towels can be tossed.