Braver Than Storebought: Swifter Dust Mop Sheets

When I bought my house there was nasty flattened used-to-be white-but-now-it's-grey carpet in my living room.  I told Dad of All Trades that I was going to rip it out and refinish the floors.  "Beeeee careful", he warned in his Dad voice.  "You might not like what you see under there". 

Well, I ripped up the floor anyway with as much pleasure as a little kid gets from ripping off a scab.  And, sure enough, wood floors underneath!  I wish I had before and after pics. 

Anyway, I LOVE my wood floors, although next time, I'd hire a professional to do it.  That floor sander is hard on a girl's arms, let me tell ya!   With no carpeting in the house, I go through a LOT of Swifter floor dusters.  I love them, but it gets expensive. 

But why dust floors when you can sew, right?  Except that sewing generates a lot of scrap fabric.  Like this pile of waste from this project and a pair of pj pants that I made:   

It pains me to have to toss out such big scrap pieces.  Then inspiration struck.  Expensive Swifter dusters....lots of fabric scraps....aha!!  I can make my own duster cloths! 

This was a great project to do in front of the TV since it requires absolutely no brain power.  Added bonus, my husband to be was sitting next to me watching me be so resourceful.

I will, of course, remind him of this resourcefulness when we get in our first fight over how much money I'm spending on fabric. 

I laid out a real Swif*er dust cloth on top of a scrap and cut around it. 

The I did it a zillion times more til my whole pile was cut to the size of dust cloths. 

As you can see, it works famously! 

Of course, not all fabrics would work.  The yellow was fleece and the pink was flannel, both of which will generate enough static to pick up dust.  Satins and other polyesters won't work as well.  But hey, using up some scraps is better than tossing them all in the trash, right!  And it's FREE.