Once started crocheting I couldn’t stop anymore.
In the new little crocheting book, that I had bought lately, I came across so called (eco) tawashi. And although you might think “Oh yes, old hat!” … I hadn’t heard about this trend before. I wanted to know more and read myself through the internet and the world of cute crocheted cleaning scrubbies.
Originally tawashi describes a brush/sponge to wash off dirt. As I learned, it became very popular over the last few years to crochet eco-friendly tawashi. Eco-friendly, cause they’re washable and therefore reusable items. There are a lot of funny kawaii tawashi ideas – have a look here to get an idea đ
I bought a bag of cotton yarn in different colours and started.
For my beginning, I sticked with the “classic” tawashi scrubbies – probably the most popular tawashi project. You can use them for you face in the bathroom, but as well as scrubby brush in the kitchen to clean the dishes. I haven’t any experience with the last usage yet, but if you’re thinking about this usage an acrylic yarn is recommended.
My second project was from my book: beautiful colour blocked washcloths. I think they’re really decorative … and so easy to crochet – a satisfying project as well for beginners.
With the remaining scraps of cotton yarn I crocheted little reusable make-up remover pads. So far they’ve fully convinced me. You can use them a few days in a row, than wash them. Although the washing instructions of the cotton yarn I used tells you to wash it at 40°C, I washed those pads at 60°C – with no losses in colour and only minimal loss in size so far.
And suddenly the bathroom looks much more colourful…
In the course of bringing these new items into our bathroom a bit of rearranging took place … and I used the chance for another DIY project that I had on my list for a while now: Handmade wire baskets … tutorial and more pictures to follow!
For all of the tawashi projects you’ll need:
– medium needle size cotton yarn, f.ex. “Cotton Universal” from “Wolle RĂśdel”, gauge: 19 sts x 26 rows = 10 x 10 cm, weight/length: 50 g/85 m, crochet hook: 4.0-5.0
(This wool has a matte look. If you prefer a shiny yarn, look for mercerised cotton.)
– crochet hook size 4.5 (metric system, for conversions have a look f.ex. here)
Tawashi washcloth
Crochet 36 chain stiches.
1. row: Crochet one single crochet into each chain stich, starting with the second chain (= 35 stiches). Turn the piece.
2. row: Begin this and each following row with a chain stich. Then crochet one single crochet into each single crochet of the previous row – but in the back loop only. This creates a textured look.
3. row: Crochet one single crochet into each single crochet of the previous row – now into both loops.
Follow this pattern (row 2 and 3) for another 13 times times in colour A, 2 times in colour B and 3 times in colour C (= 39 rows).
Tawashi scrubby
Basically you are crocheting a parallelogram of single crochets (sc). This pictured tutorial (German) from Tammy and this tutorial in English helped me to find the way. I made two different scrubby sizes: The bigger one is 22 sc x 27 rows, the smaller one: 18 sc x 21 rows
Tawashi makeup remover pads
One pad is a circle of 3 rows of single crochets. I started with a magic circle of 8 chains and increased the number of stiches in each of the following rows (1. und 2. row: 2 sc in each, 3. row: 2 sc in 1, 2 sc).
Note: I tried different ways of increasing and have to say that actually at this size it doesn’t really make a difference.
nadel&gabel 