THE SIMPLE TEA TOWEL.......

When my Grandmother passed away, and we were sorting through some of the cupboards and blanket boxes, we came across lots of vintage Tea Towels.

They were all very pretty and intricate and unused.  Some had embroidered pictures, some flowers, some birds.  Many were linen with lovely printed patterns on them.

The funny thing was, my Grandparents always, since I could remember, used the plain striped or checkered tea towels everyday.  I had never seen any of these pretty things out, even for the holidays or when they were having guests. 

My Grandmother was an Antiques Dealer but rarely did she buy linens.  She did like quilts and coverlets but they were ones she kept, which were sometimes displayed in the bedrooms, but she really never was into tea towels.  This could only mean that most of these were gifts to her problably from when she had gotten married.

After finding these beautiful old pieces I started to think about my own tea towels.  I realized that like my Grandmother, I had a stash put away myself.  I went home and took them out of one of the blanket boxes.  Lo and behold, I had quite a few from my wedding showers and birthday gifts.  What was I saving them for?

I am pretty sure my Grandmother and I are not the only Towel Hoarders out there.  Do you have some lovely linen tea towels that are just too nice to dry dishes with.  Why not take them out of their storage spaces and make something out of them.  Pillows are alway good.  I have made some of my nicest pillow covers from old and new tea towels.

Curtains are always a great thing to use vintage tea towels for.  I love the linen striped ones, so country looking.  If you have a lot of the same type, like floral or birds, stitch them all together and make one big curtain or use them as a tablecloth.

They make great bags too, just the right size.

I am not that old but I don't think many people use these anymore.  I remember in one of my first Home Economics classes ( do they have those now!) I sewed a clothespin bag out of a tea towel.  I love them and they really are very useful.

I absolutely adore this idea, I am going to do these for our grandbabies.  You can buy terrycloth tea towels very cheaply and if you go to OBSESSIVELY STITICHING BLOG you can get the step by step instructions for this cute little robe.

So why not get out those tea towels, what are you saving them for?  If you don't want to repurpose them then just use them.  I make sure I buy really pretty tea towels now, I have them for all of the seasons and holidays and I just love to use them and look at them hanging on the hook in the kitchen, they are so happy to be out of the blanket box.