Join me for a riveting thread about tea towels!

[TheChosenTwo]

How many do you have? A kitchen disaster has meant dh was clearing out and removing cupboards today. I’ve had a sort through the tea towels before they all go back in (kitchen disaster is now under control) and we have got 25 - this sounds like absolutely loads and it’s probably 30 due to some probably waiting to be washed and some in the dryer.
Have you got more? Less?
If I’m wildly hoarding tea towels I’ll happily let some go but was curious as to how many you’ve all got lurking. Possibly no one will answer as let’s face it, who’s trawling their way to their kitchens now just to count tea towels…
PS, we also have a similar number of dishcloths…

About 30, and 20 to 30 smaller terry cloths, all in the same drawer.

They get used for absolutely everything - we don’t use paper towels or J cloths really, it’s all tea towels or the little cloths.
Used ones get chucked in the former nappy bin. When the bin is full they go on a hot wash and it starts again.

When too stained or full of holes for the kitchen, they get downgraded to shed or garage use. When too ruined for that, torn into strips and used as self-watering wicks in the greenhouse for when we’re away.

I have 28. Four of those are freebies from Ocado and such like. I love a good tea towel. Have a couple of my dear departed mum's that are so evocative. Reading this has made me realize I can definitely add to my collection. Thanks OP. 😄

I have about 10 in use and another 10 in storage because they have drawings or hand prints from the DC when they were little. I love the well-used thin cotton ones that bring back happy memories, but the thicker checked ones are more practical to get stuff in and out of the Aga without burning myself. I tend to have one of each out at the same time.

Honestly, it made me laugh, no offence taken here 🥰

i have about 15 in regular rotation, one per day and washed with the towels (and then ironed because... i like ironing nice easy things, and they look lovely all neatly folded)

I have 4 Christmas ones that go into the rotation on 1st December, and i did have 4 autumn themed ones that came out in September-ish but somehow they are still there.

I actually patch the ones that get a bit holey at the edges, but i also cull them regularly (they go in the car/garage mostly to use as oil rags or to clean the bikes)

@LollyWillow your collection sounds right up my strasse. I also have a strict rotation system so none are neglected... 😄

I'm 56 not 16. I know that 🤣🤣

but I'm still traumatised 🤣🤣. when I was young (19 maybe?!?!). My boyfriend's mum had given me a table to use in my flat. It was French polished... can you see where this is going?? I ironed on a thick, folded, bath towel and it still melted into the towel🙇🏻‍♀️🙇🏻‍♀️🙄🥲

I rang around to find a couple of blokes who did French polishing & it's a dying skill, so quoted a fucking fortune. I was 🥹🥹🥹🥲

my boyfriend told his mum, and she said not to be so silly accidents happen & the table wasn't worth it to spend that much money on getting fixed, but I felt sooooo bad.🙇🏻‍♀️🙇🏻‍♀️🙇🏻‍♀️

Especially as I was a generally very careful and very bright teenager who had been living away from home and working for a good couple of years. (I was born old.!!)

I just hadn't realised how easily the French polish would melt 🙇🏻‍♀️🙇🏻‍♀️

This place is honestly tiny, I would have to move the coffee maker in the air fryer off of the kitchen bench, not entirely sure where I'd put them, to iron on the kitchen bench and until the renovations and decorations are finished, there's no table.

So I've just had to come to terms with an iron tea towels and pillowcases 🤣🤣

French polishers are magicians. I thought my beautiful 250 year old original wooden floor was done for after my nephew weed on a rug and I didn’t discover it for a week (BIL blamed the guinea pigs, but that was another thread…). Found this old French polisher, he must have been 98 if he was a day, and his trickery made the stain disappear completely. Couldn’t believe it. He only charged about a tenner, too, despite coming back three times to perfect it, as each time he needed to let his work dry. I got the impression he was doing it just for the sheer joy of it.

Yes, it's definitely a dying magical art!!

I bet the joy gave him far exceeded any money you could have paid him, I don't expect he gets much of an opportunity to impress people with his skill any more, which is really sad.

The blokes I found (many years ago) were 'older' but not Old.

They wanted hundreds and the table was one my boyfriend's mother had had stored as a spare & she didn't want me to spend a fortune on getting it polished.

To this day, I still feel bad though🥹

Probably about 10, they have to fit in a tiny drawer so I usually get have to cut the down and iron the fuckers

I don't dream of a fancy pants kitchen apart from having one with a big enough tea towel drawer so I can just throw them in with even having to fold the blighters

I have maybe 15 tea towels and 3 kitchen towels. I’m the only person I know that still actively searches out kitchen towels and I only tend to find them in Europe. They are so much better than standard tea towels, larger but not too big, very absorbent and just better all around.

i iron them because, well, i quite like ironing (i listen to all the podcasts and i find it relaxing) and also because they sit nicely and flat in the drawer, and finally because it (maybe only in my head) adds an extra element of sterilising them

Loads! I love getting teatowels as souvenirs of places I've visited and now people often bring them for me when they go away too.

A woman after my own heart!! I have around one hundred (!), I love fabric but am hopeless at sewing, so if I see a nice tea towel design I'll get it as, like yourself, they remind me of special places.
My daughter bought me another one for Mothers' Day 😃.
Edited to add: they are all nicely ironed, as well!

8 I know because we've just redone our kitchen and I binned all the old tatty ones and bought a five pack and a prettier 3 pack

I have a drawer in the kitchen devoted to tea towels. I have Christmas ones, ones that my children brought home from school, ones from holidays and days out, ones just for polishing glasses. I’ve just counted and I have 50, which see me out 👍

p.s. All my tea towels are ironed and folded

Just put out a lovely new one today.
Hoping it doesn’t immediately get used as a cleaning rag…

12 or so plus a few old ones in the understairs cupboard for use for spillages, dishwasher leaks type stuff.

The ones in circulation live in a basket in one of our nooks (old house)

I've probably got about 25, some of which were inherited from MIL.
None of them are sparkling to be honest, all well washed, faded and tired.
They live in a kitchen cabinet drawer and I dry them folded on the kitchen radiator, so they look ironed.

(Apart from the green with sunflowers stunt tea towel, of course)

On the verge of getting the utility room sorted out (🤞) which is when I'll cut them all up for rags and invest in new ones, which will be regularly boiled in my baby burco, and hopefully they will stay white.

about 30
change them often as they get used for hands as well as spills and dishes (we don't use kitchen roll)

We have 3 terry towelling tea towels that are the kitchen hand towels.

I am constantly on the lookout for kitchen towels @OnyourbarksGSG. I got some nice ones from France via Souschef a few years ago but they have stopped selling them. I'm finding it impossible to source a decent supply - I think it may just be the two of us.

I love a tea towel! We have have loads, can't count them as I'd have to hunt them all down. I especially like some very old tea towels and they are my favourite ones as I like how soft they go if they are nice quality ones. We use them all the time for mopping up spills, hand drying, all sorts of stuff. I have some that my parents bought about 30 years ago, some from holiday places and also some that I rescued from the bin when I helped my friend clear her dm's house. I get quite sad if I finally have to move a tea towel to a new life under the sink or in the garage, but it's nice to still see them from time to time. What a great thread, OP!

Besides the sweary one, one of my favourites is a Babycham tea towel that came from my grandad's pub.

He retired in 1976 and it's still going strong, albeit a bit faded (and slightly orange where something coloured ended up in the same wash!)