In the past we had an expectation that our kids (5 and 3) would leave the table after mealtime and wash their faces and hands in the bathroom nearby. But getting them the 10 feet to the bathroom without touching stuff with messy hands has turned out to be impossible - or at least it's bugging me more now that its EVERY meal EVERY day. Some advice that seemed to work well was to keep a wet cloth at the table and we just give them a quick wipe down before they leave, and it had the added bonus that we could clean up table spills quickly too. But those got so stinky so fast. They're just regular washcloths, nothing special. So my question is does anyone have either a different behavioral solution or a different type of cloth that they use for this that works well?
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We have them use either kitchen towels that get washed, or paper towels when I have laundry issues. The other thing is working on getting them to eat more neatly...it's a process, to say the least, but worth investing in early and often.
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We use cloth napkins so he just uses that to clean his hands and face, clears his plate and then washes his hands/face if they need additional cleaning.
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It helps if you wash them with vinegar. If you don't mind disposable baby wipes are perfect for this.
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We have two sets of the Norwex baby cloths and I like them a lot. They don’t get stinky fast the way regular wash cloths do.
https://shopus.norwex.biz/en_US/customer/shop/product-detail/309031 -
I don’t have the Norwex baby cloths but I have several of their other products and none of them get stinky, ever. I feel like the kitchen cloths would be a good size for this
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I just have a ton of cheap-ish washcloths in a drawer. As soon as they don’t feel fresh I hang them on the laundry basket and get a new one, which is sometimes every meal and never longer than a day. As long as they dry out vs sitting in a heap I haven’t had smells stick around.
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I cut up a bunch of my husband’s old white t-shirts into small squares/rectangles and I use them as “wipes.” I keep one hanging near the table, and wet and wipe hands/faces as needed. They’re so thin they dry fast. And I like how soft they are. I just have one hanging at a time- as soon as it’s a few days old I’ll throw in the wash and use another one.
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My son (6) is ok with the walk to the bathroom. It's not too disasterous.
My twins turned 2 yesterday. They are still pretty messy at the table. I just use baby wipes or a wet paper towel to wipe down their hands. If the food is especially messy then I also follow up with washing hands at the sink. It's not environmentally friendly but I am too overwhelmed for anything more complicated.
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We just keep a package of wipes on the table for easy clean up.
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Norwex! I can't stand any sort of MLM type of products but love everything about Norwex.
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We have "baby" wash clothes for this. I use one wet wash cloth per child to wash/wipe face and hands after each meal. My 4yos still choose to use hands over forks/spoons sometimes. Generally they are way less messy than at 1 yo....but I still find this essential since it never ends well when DH tries to let them walk to the bathroom with dirty hands
I started doing this around 1 yo.
We keep the dirty washcloths in an old cool whip container near the kitchen sink (yup we are *that* classy) and toss it in with a load of laundry every 3/4 days.
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@ElbieKay: Same. I still use wipes or a paper towel bc I cannot handle the extra laundry. I try to make it up to Mother Earth in other ways.
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Thanks everyone! I love seeing what works for different families. I think we’ll start with giving them their own napkins and seeing if they can use them appropriately. It seems like the ideal situation. And if it doesn’t work out we might be buying some Norwex
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They each get a cloth napkin during dinner itself and then when they’re done we have a bunch of flannel baby wipes we never really used that we get wet to wipe down. If they’re not too messy I reuse for meals during day but otherwise use new ones every day. Never get smelly.
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Another vote for disposable baby wipes. I'm an essential worker so we're doing as many disposable things as possible right now so that there's no chance of germs lingering and spreading on things.
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