Dirt Ground into Bottom of Socks

I learned a trick from my wise cousin...buy black socks :-)

4 moms found this helpful

That's what the bottoms of sock are for! Just launder and live with a certain amount of grunginess. They'll be clean enough to wear, and the same thing will just happen again anyway.

It's a shame to waste resources, and cotton requires great amounts of water and energy to grow and process. So I wouldn't toss them. And it's a shame to poison the wastewater stream with chlorine or other strong cleaners. Those chemicals can't all be removed before that water returns to the environment that our children and grandchildren will grow up in.

If you feel too obsessive about spotlessness to live with it, I hope you'll at least donate the stained socks to a shelter.

3 moms found this helpful

For all my stains I use the blue spray bottle of Shout Advanced...works for everything I've had to deal with. Spray it on, let it set for a few days, spray some more, and wash.

But honestly, are socks worth it? Try to keep them clean (no socks outside without shoes!) and just pitch them and buy new ones when necessary.

1 mom found this helpful

My mom used to use a bar of Ivory soap on our stained whites. She'd wet the area, then rub it really well with the bar of soap and wash it. It worked on grass/dirt stains on our white baseball pants (really, who decided on white baseball pants!) . . . Good luck!

I mix lemon juice & baking soda and apply. kind of scrub it in and then wash. hope it helps.

Pre-treat with Resolve, then wash in hot water on the longest cycle with soap, Tide booster and bleach. Otherwise, the dirt is just in there. Time for new socks. And floor cleaner.

I can't stand grungy socks even if you can't see them. This sounds like a lot but I use Tide, Clorox 2, and a scoop of oxy powder in every white load. (I throw in light colored socks that won't bleed with the whites.) It works wonders. Once they go through the drier the stains are pretty much set. I have soaked socks that I dried in a bucket with hot water and oxy powder. They soaked for a day or two and then I washed them. Most of the stains came out.

Shout Advance is AWESOME! BUT--you might be better off buying new socks :(

how about if you buy white socks that are gray on the bottom? then you won't notice. not sure if the gray-bottomed ones are in the girl section. i usually think of them as boy socks.

Have you tried bleach?

I hate that and more often than not, I end up pitching the gross socks and replacing them.

Need to know how to do this also

I throw it away.

Or, use a stain remover and let it sit, even over night, pre-treating it.