Anyone got any ideas for washing handkerchiefs

I wrote
pocket square. above.
But my phone is too young to have heard of them so presumes to correct me.

Momac55

I wouldn’t dream of washing snot

Yup

Disgusting thought.
I have never used or washed cloth hankies.
I can see that a pocket share might look nice in a breast pocket.
But if it ever got used for anything at all I would bin it.
Personally I separate one toilet roll from the pack keep it apart and use that.
Disposed in the loo.

Sarnia

Back in the 1950's when I helped my Granny with the washing she had an old saucepan which was kept just for boiling handkerchiefs. She added a chunk of Sunlight soap to the water and let it simmer for an hour or two before rinsing.
I'm sure times have changed since those days, Notagranny44 but you have brought back a fond memory of post-war wash days.

My Mum did exactly that!

Unless I have a very bad cold, I just put my hankies in to the ordinary white wash at 90 degrees centigrade along with my underpants, bath and face towels and my bed linen.

Certainly, steeping them in a solution of salt and water similar to what we used for messy underpants when we had periods will help too, if you dislike the thought of just bunging them into the white wash.

I have never used paper hankies, as I cannot stand the smell of them, and find the texture of them unpleasant too.

As a severe hay fever suffere I am not keen on cotton hankies. I shudder at the days when I was a small child and my mum safety pinned one of my dad's hankies to my clothes so that I always had one to hand. By the nd of each day I had a soggy, messy rag pinned to my jumper. Ugh!

I changed from tissues to hankies a few years ago. Much kinder on my nose!
Unless I have a cold I just put them in with the whites on a 60 wash.
If I’ve a cold, I soak in a Milton type solution then wash with the whites.

We’re team hanky , I just chuck them in with the towels and tea towels on a 60 wash . My mother uses tissues and I have to go through the pockets when I wash her clothes 🤮. If I miss one it’s always in a dark wash and everything comes out with tissue bits 🤬

I wouldn’t dream of washing snot

Notagranny44

I've just been filling in a survey on my local council's waste management strategy and it has made me wonder how we can reduce our use of single-use items.
I always seem to have a runny nose and/or phlegmy throat, so use quite a lot of tissues. I would happlily move to using handkerchiefs, but have early unpleasant memories of washing them before my Mum had a washing machine!
Would soaking them before washing in a bucket of salty water or bio wash powder mean that I could just put them in the machine to get them clean.
Any thoughts anyone?

Use Kleenex fgs

When I was very young, my mother boiled them all in a huge old saucepan.

It must have been all right then for a 7-year old to use an iron - I've just remembered standing on a stool and having the job of ironing them!

Agree! Good for you.

My husband uses them every day, I've just been chucking them in the washing machine with the usual washing for the past 20 years

👍

Sorry, but IMO fabric handkerchiefs are gross.
I’d have to boil them, but preferably chuck them on to an open fire.
Thank goodness for tissues!

I’m all for reducing waste and recycling, BTW, but there are limits…

After years of dealing with my husbands snotty hankies I now refuse to handle them !! Revolting business. Simply not prepared to deal with them . I now bag and bin them .
I will probably get shot down in flames on this forum but its now tissues. His handkerchiefs are slowly disappearing- thank goodness !

Whitewavemark2

My DH has never used anything else but white mens hankies.

They get washed with all the other whites at 90c.

On the program Sliced Bread they discussed whether washing at 90degrees makes any difference.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0030243

Sarnia

Back in the 1950's when I helped my Granny with the washing she had an old saucepan which was kept just for boiling handkerchiefs. She added a chunk of Sunlight soap to the water and let it simmer for an hour or two before rinsing.
I'm sure times have changed since those days, Notagranny44 but you have brought back a fond memory of post-war wash days.

Ooh bet it was like porridge 😂

midgey

I just lob them in my machine!

Yes all the male resident hankies all went in a mixed wash-cross contamination no doubt 😂

grannyjan2

I read of a machine cleaning regime somewhere, involving soda crystals on a 90º wash cycle. So I do this every 3 months or so and put the hankies, as they are, in for that cycle.
2 jobs in one.
I needed to have enough hankies to see me through that long.

I cleaned my old washer that way & next wash I did was towels all came out covered in black gunk 😩
So it does work!

DH’s hankies go in the washing machine on a 60 degree wash. I go through a lot of tissues so maybe I need a re-think …

Thank you all for your suggestions. I don't want to make a lot of work for myself, just send less to landfill, although I think we are pretty good at recycling anyway! The napkin idea would really be no different to tissues though.
I think I'll get a few cotton hankies and try putting them to soak in a bio washing powder solution and see how I go.
In the old days we didn't have bio anything to deal with the slime, did we?

I ve not seen a hanky for donkey years just use tissues

I always carry a hankie with me because I’m really sniffy, especially if I go from outside to inside. Never actually blow my nose into it though. I think everyone should be made to carry a hanky by law; just think how many trees it would save. If I used it properly I would soak it beforehand in Milton, though. If I do have a cold ( last time I had one I was blowing my nose for what seemed like forever) I use toilet paper and then burn it in the garden incinerator.

And ours do. In fact, I often do what I think of as a boil wash at 60° with lots of Biotex in it. We are fairly healthy despite that.