Friday, August 8, 2008

Recycled Flannel Bed Sheets

It is becoming a challenge and a point of a bit of joking that anything in the house made of fabric will be recycled into something else as soon as it has lost it's usefulness. Such is the case with some bedding we were given.

We received some sheets that are in great condition, but the family no longer wanted them. They had tried to sell them in a yard sale with no luck, so gave them to us to sell in our yard sale. After taking a look at the sheets, I rescued them from the sale table and they have been laundered and set aside to be made into other things.

One set was of a heavy flannel. The sheets are much too large for our beds, so I have been using them to make diapers. I then realised that they are heavy enough to make very absorbant kitchen towels, which we are always needing more of! So, today I have been cutting the sheet up into the size needed and made ready to run through the overloc machine. In less than an hour, I will have a stack of new kitchen towels! I am loving this. The towels will be far more absorbant than the store bought variety and I am able to make them a larger size that is more practical.

Heavy flannel sheets that may have worn areas can be recycled to be the towels used for draining fried foods onto or for cleaning up the more nasty messes that can stain your nicer towels. This will eliminate the need for paper towels.

If you have a double-layer of the flannel and an old windbreaker jacket, you can stack the flannel on top of the windbreaker to make bed pads for placing in a baby crib. From a large king-size flannel flat sheet, you can make 2 crib/toddler bed sized fitted sheets or a stack of long pillow cases to be slipped over a bassinet mattress.

I would love to hear your ideas for recycling old flannel sheets.