Some Scrubbies and Some Recycling

No, it's not Christmas again...guess you can tell I have a predominately green kitchen! Here is a stack of scrubbies from a bunch of patterns that I recently tried out. I needed a little break from my sock knitting ( yes, I did finish a new sock and I am presently working on it's mate) and thought I would try out a few scrubbie patterns (or tawashi as the Japanese call them)
and see how they compare. I'm using scraps of acrylic yarn with recycled plastic netting from onion bags.

To prepare the bags for knitting: I cut the bottom and top off a bag, washed and dried them. Then make one long strip out of the bag with a few simple steps. First open up the bag (bottomless bag) up by cutting it lengthwise into a rectangle. Then cut strips by cutting it as seen in this very poorly drawn diagram: Here is my assortment of srubbies:
The first thing you notice is that there is a size difference.
This small one is a Circular Scrubby from the Dishcloth Duo pattern. It was the smallest. Being small does have it's merits though. Good for scrubbing tight places. It can be made bigger. Check out Knottykitty's version here. You can see the red plastic netting, which will hopefully work out well as a dish scrubber.

This next one is I think is the easiest and fastest knit.

I used the Scrubbles pattern. This one is very easy and fast. Works great with the netting knit with the acrylic yarn. This one will be a work horse I'm sure. It reminds me of a green frosted donut with with red sprinkles :)

This next one is the Tribble pattern. This one I think takes the longest time to knit. You need a 10 inch piece before you assemble it. That's pretty big!

I'm sure it will make a heavy duty scrubber. It is a really good size one and with this one I used a mixture of red and white netting. The netting is hard on your hands. Not the easiest fiber to knit with. But for such a small project I definitely think it's worth it. Plus you are using something you would normally just throw in the trash. After all you are just using it as a scouring pad and not making an heirloom. I have thought of using nylon netting or tulle, but I would imagine it wouldn't be as effective at scrubbing since it is gets less stiff with use.

For these last two I got out my crochet hook and did a little crocheting.
The one on the left is done the right way and the one on the right is done the wrong way. When I made the first one I didn't read the part in the pattern that stated you crochet through the back loop. This is what makes the ridges and makes a better scrubber. I tried using the netting with this pattern, but found it too difficult and annoying crocheting the plastic netting. Knitting the netting is so much easier. The crochet pattern I used is the Spiral Scrubbie pattern.

In conclusion, here are my final thought on the subject of scrubbies. Even though I think the best looking and easy scrubbie is the dishcloth duo's circular scrubbie and making one bigger would be better.... I have to give my seal of approval to scrubbles for being the easiest and quickest to make and therefore the most practical one :)

Enough with the scrubbies already and now back to my socks!!
Happy Knitting :)