Whether its one-ply, two-ply or a fancy quilted pattern, most people would probably admit that they can't live without toilet paper. But for blogger Angela Davis, toilet paper is no longer a necessity. She joined HuffPost Live to talk about the challenges and unexpected benefits of going T.P.-free.
Davis, who runs Frugal Living NW, stopped using toilet paper as an experiment. "I am in the Pacific Northwest, in Portland, Or., and we were going to explore different ways to go green. [We] kind of do some extreme things, like try to shop for food with no packaging and go altogether not shopping for any extracurricular items that my family might need or use. And one of the things we thought to do is to go without toilet paper for two weeks. Because everyone in the Northwest already recycles everything and kind of goes crazy, so this was the big thing we were going to do."
She added, "We went for it basically to entertain our readers and show them a different side of going green that they hadn't thought of before."
Instead of toilet paper, Davis and her family used homemade cloths, which they would place in a basket and wash a few times per week. Because the cloths are reusable, they are more environmentally friendly than toilet paper.
But Davis also discovered that ditching toilet paper was better for her wallet. "We were spending about $136 a year. And the cost of wipes, I actually purchased the material for the wipes--other people who are much smarter than me just used old t-shirts or flannel sheets--so that cost was about $42 a year. And that included the cost of washing them two or three times a week, and the cost of the detergent, and also the cost of the water."
"So by using wipes for that first year, we probably would have saved $90-95. And then after that, because you don't have to buy the supplies, the savings would go up from there."
Joining Davis and host Caitlyn Becker in the conversation were bloggers Kathleen Quiring and Makala Earley. Watch the full conversation on HuffPost Live.