Bed Sheets
Seems like a trivial subject, bed sheets. However, if you have shopped for sheets recently, you know it is no trivial thing.
When I was first married, it was a simple enough thing to shop for sheets. There were two kinds of sheets, muslin and percale. Muslin was soft and inexpensive and percale was smooth and required no ironing. Percale was a little more expensive, but worth the difference.
Today it is an entirely different story. I guess somewhere they may sell muslin sheets, but I don’t know where. I have seen percale sheets in a few places, but you have to really look to find them. The big thing in sheets today is ‘thread count’. The higher the thread count, the more expensive the sheet. According to one website, thread count refers to the number of horizontal and vertical threads in one square inch of fabric.
Theoretically, the higher the thread count the softer the sheets. Sounds good, eh? Really soft sheets! But there is a huge drawback here, they wrinkle. They wrinkle a lot! Wrinkled sheets look terrible! And they cost a lot of money. A really big lot of money!
Now I don’t know about most folks, but this old woman is not about to iron sheets! And IF I were foolish enough to pay the high price for these high thread count sheets (I have seen over $400), I would expect them to change the bed when dirty, throw themselves in the washer and dryer, press themselves and make the bed. Since I know they won’t do any of that, I ain’t buying these suckers! So there.
A Consumer Reports issue some time back reported anything over 400 thread count is a waste of money and 200 thread count will last just as well and provide all the comfort needed. Good Old Consumer Reports, I will follow their advice and I won’t sleep on wrinkled sheets. I will also have more money to spend on other things, like software. I do have my priorities straight!
Martha
Posted by: Martha | 01-18-2008 | 11:01 AM
Posted in: Life in General
Gosh, if only I had read this before I bought the new 500 thread count shar-pei of sheets and then thought to ask Martha what to do about it.
If ironing wasn’t enough of a real pain, the smell of starch in lieu of delightful laundry fragrances is a decided turnoff.
I recently decided to splurge on some sheeting when I came across sheets that are made of wood! I guess it has no thread count but it feels so silky! I found this website (http://www.elegantlinenspc.com/) that sent me a swatch and once I got it I was instantly sold! So I’ve had them for couple months now and I wont sleep on anything else! The best part is that they don’t require ironing! They were a little pricey but it was worth every penny!