Knit dishcloth

Update: I've since piloted Exhibit B, which won this trial. Check it out! 

At my house, there are 4 roommates. We go through a lot of dishes, and as such, we also go through a lot of dish cleaning implements, soap and everything else related to dish-washing.

My roommate Lukas used to use these store-bought dishcloths and I shut them down pretty quickly. We'd use them a few times, then they'd start to smell really badly. The proposed solution? Someone went out and got disposable plastic sponges.

Now, clearly, that wasn't going to fly with me, so I finally got fed up and decided that I could make dishcloths for us. If I made them breathable and still sturdy, they shouldn't smell so bad so quickly, in theory. So I invested in some appropriate yarn (75% recycled cotton) and knit us our very first homemade dishcloth.

This yarn is made from 75% recycled cotton. Acrylics are not nearly absorbent enough to be effective dishcloths, so if you're looking to make your own, look for a high percentage (preferably 100%) cotton yarn.

Then I just had to find a good pattern, which I ended up getting on-line. (Check out the waffle knit dishcloth pattern, if you're looking to make your own. It's totally free and quite pretty, for that matter.)

And it worked. This little guy has been in use for well over a week and isn't showing any signs of funk. What's more, my roommates seem happy with the way it cleans.

Our very first homemade dishcloth after its first trial run!

Success! (Next up: a whole set of them!)