A long time ago, so long in fact, I don’t even remember getting these bed sheets.  It was definitely pre-Y2K, maybe around 1998.  They were great flannel sheets, but I had a black dog who never quit shedding and who also slept in bed with me.  If you’ve ever had flannel sheets and a dog you know what I’m talking about.  This shit collects dog hair that no clothes drier can suck off and lint rollers are also fairly useless; it just starts to ball up and all one can do is pluck it off one ball at a time.

The second life of my flannel sheets was as a curtain.  I know, it doesn’t sound too classy, but I had these metal coils at the top corners of my bedroom window and I could twist the corners of the sheets through them and it made a really nice drape.  At least good enough for a single girl/college student who didn’t have a lot of visitors to her bedroom.

After that, the sheet got used as a moving pad and for other odd duties.

It was after I had my son in 2009 that I found a new useful purpose for the sheets, the top sheet anyway.  After debating on whether to use cloth diapers, disposable diapers, or a diaper service – I regrettably (for the Earth) went with disposables, washing diapers would have been the straw that broke my back as a new mom, I knew my limits.  BUT I decided to make my own reusable butt wipes for diaper changes and created a great butt spray to go with them.

Butt Wipes & Spray

I folded the sheet in half and then in half again and started cutting 6″ x 6″ squares with my rotary cutter and then sewed around the edges of each square with a zig-zag stitch to keep the flannel from coming unwoven in the washing machine.  It was a lot of mindless sewing and I actually sewed my index finger once.  Crazy OUCH!  But the needle was in and out before I even realized it.  I made about 100 wipes and I wash them in one little load about once a week (Soak for 20+ minutes in cold water, drain & spin, then wash with soap in hot water).

This still left me with about 500 6″ squares from the king size sheet.  I’d saved them, not knowing if I would need more butt wipes or whatever.

AWESOME Cotton Pads!

A couple weeks ago I found an AWESOME astringent recipe on Pinterest that I’ve made and I love it so much I decided to start using it twice a day.  I was suddenly going through twice as many cotton pads as before and I like to use the fancy cotton pads that aren’t really very cheap.  SO I whipped out my 6″ squares of flannel, folded them into a smaller square and zig-zag stitched around the open edges.  VIOLA – a reusable pad I can use with my astringent!  I was so impressed with myself.  Who’s kidding who?  I’m still impressed.

I’ve also sewn 2 squares together to make a double thick 6″ square, but these are a bit too thick to use as butt wipes on my son, they just don’t get in those little, baby cracks very well.  However, I have used them as little cleaning wipes and kleenex tissues.  They go well in my purse for small accidents on the go too.

The Odd Rectangle Wipe

My last experiment with the squares was just to fold them in half and sew up the open edges, making it a 3″ x 6″ rectangle.  They sort of fall in the middle of the above sizes and I’m not sure what to do with them.  I’ve considered them to be either larger face pads or perhaps as axillary inserts into reusable menstrual pads.

Just to be clear, I make sure to wash all my different wipes in different loads!  The butt wipes get their own bin and washing cycle and my face wipes and other non-gross wipes get thrown in a lingerie bag and wash with my clothes.  And anything else gets its own wash too.  :)

This bed sheet has seen more action than any other sheets in my life!!

Do you have any other ideas for all my extra squares??