20 February 2011

Use What You Have

I love flannel sheets in the winter time! Unfortunately, one of my sheets developed a very large hole, it just plain wore out. I also love my Swiffer Sweeper. What I don't like about my Sweeper is the fact that the fiber cloths are disposable and pricey.

So I cut up the usable portions of the flannel sheet into 9x12" rectangles. I layered two and serged the edges and then big stitched them together.

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That is one big honkin' needle. But you need a big needle to pull the doubled crochet cotton through the two layers of flannel. I stitched from corner to corner diagonally in both directions and then stitched straight across both horizontally and vertically.

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I ended up with a stack of these cleaning pads that not only fit on my Sweeper, but can also be used as plain ole dust rags.  Best of all, they are totally green and I used what I have on hand.

16 comments:

  1. What a clever idea! I've never used a Swifter because of the waste, but I do have an old flannel sheet in my rag bin...

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  2. That's a great idea. I don't use a swiffer, because of the price of the disposable pads.

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  3. Great idea - also saw something last week where a gal knitted covers for her dust mop. She knitted a rectangle longer than the mop and folded over the ends and stitched them down. The ends would stretch to fit over the mop base. They could be thrown in the laundry as well.

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  4. Love it! You can use them again and again and again *s*

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  5. Brilliant... just brilliant! I'm all for reusing things like worn out sheets... and we can all use good cleaning "rags"...

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  6. Anonymous9:04 AM

    Good idea. I'll have to stitch some up from my worn sheets.
    Thanks for the suggestion.
    cindy

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  7. And I thought I was clever crocheting covers with leftovers from cotton yarn projects! This is a great idea and I just happen to have a flannel fitted sheet that has seen better days!

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  8. Quilters certainly are resourceful. Thanks for sharing a brilliant idea.

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  9. Very clever, very cool and just the kind of contributing post that folks appreciate. You go!

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  10. I love this idea! I love my Swiffer vacuum sweeper but hate having to buy the pads so I'm going to be trying this. I'm wondering why you stitched it by hand after you serged the edges? Could you not have done it on the machine? I recently used a worn flanel sheet as the batting on my quilt wrap - I wanted a little body but not much and it worked perfectly. blessings, marlene

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  11. Well done. It makes you feel good that you have had a useful idea and are recycling at the same time.

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  12. Love this!!! Yay green, you are so cleaver!
    Vicki
    I'm off to rummage for some scrap flannel!

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  13. Anonymous5:44 AM

    CLEVER!!!

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  14. that is so brilliant!!!! I totally bow to your greenness!!!!!

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  15. Now that's using your noggin - great idea.

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  16. Good idea. I love my swiffer,and use (old) washcloths on mine. When it gets dirty just throw it in the washer and grab another one. My DH calls me a tight-wad! I don't like the wet ones you can buy..they leave a sticky residue on the tile.

    Yes, us quilters are very resourceful!

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