Wednesday, January 27, 2010

cloth vs. paper napkins ~ Tree Huggin' Tuesday

I have a dozen beautiful red cloth napkins in my hutch drawer. I have 300+ paper napkins stored under my side board. I am proud of one, ashamed of the other...

With six of us at the table (most under the age of 13), it's hard for the kids to remember to use them unless the napkins are placed under their cutlery AND they are told to keep them after they are finished eating. There's already enough to remind them of at the table...and when I'm even sick of hearing my own nagging voice, well...*sigh*...I've become defeated and succumbed to using them too.

No more thanks to Hip Mountain Mama and her Tree Huggin' Tuesday post today! She has resurrected my determination to get everyone on board, again, to using cloth napkins instead of paper! Let me emphasise my enthusiasm with more exclamation points ~ !!!!!!!!!

Six napkins washed every few days with the reds and pinks (which we have alot of being a 3 girl family) doesn't take up that much room or use that much more water in the washer that it's going to tip my water bill to an exurbanite amount. We save ourselves money and stop using trees for one more self-serving thing. Having felt unsupported in my efforts, I sent my partner the link to Hip Mama's post this morning (and linked it through my twitter account ~ hi my love!) in hopes that he'll read it and realize that the bigger picture is more important than the convenience of (stupid) paper napkins.

I am on a crusade today...to hide the paper napkins (HA!!)...and put out pretty cloth ones instead ( I like the idea of having a basket of them instead of in the hutch). If their hands are that dirty they'll either wash them, or "Oh! Look! I can use this red thing..."

Go on, make the switch, feel the softness of cloth vs paper, look for pretty colors and patterns to reflect your mood or cuisine, notice the savings on your grocery bill! It's not just for fancy schmancy dinners anymore, and somewhere, a tree is thanking you.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have been using cloth at our house for over a year now. Instead of buying cloth napkins, I bought kitchen wash clothes (I think you are supposed to use them to wash dishes but I like the ones with the mesh scrubby things on the back better for washing dishes). The washclothes have grooves in them unlike a regular cloth napkin that helps to clean kids hands better. Plus they are cheaper. I do have clothe napkins for when others eat with us, though. People didn't understand why I was giving them washclothes. lol

Anonymous said...

I like it! I really like it. In fact I stopped using paper towels for EVERTHING - I would go through rolls so fast - what a waste.

So now you've inspired me to buy some. Maybe I'll pick up a bunch of colourful bandanas at the dollar store to use as 100% cotton napkins!
Peace sista!!

Leah said...

SOOOOO pleased to see this support of cloth napkins (one of my creative sparks)

Check out www.eatkins.weebly.com

:)