Oliver has managed to stain my two favorite shirts of his with spaghetti sauce (This is what happens when I leave him with daddy while I go to work and while I am too sick to get out of bed). The shirts are difficult to describe. It's like they are a t-shirt, and then into the end of the t-shirt sleeves, long white sleeves are sewn in to make it a long sleeve shirt. The stains are, of course, on the white sleeves. The clothes were already washed once before I noticed the stains. I got some Oxi Stain Removal gel and scrubbed that stuff on there, letting it sit for 10 minutes before throwing them in the washing machine again (Per directions on the gel stick). I just moved them over to the dryer and it looks like the stains lightened but are not gone and are still noticeable. URG! These are my two favorite shirts of his!!! One is a nicer dress shirt that he wore at Thanksgiving and Christmas, they other is just a play shirt but it says 'I May Be Naughty But I'm Good At It'. Why couldn't hubby have fed him spaghetti while wearing one his ugly shirts that I don't care for?
So, is there any hope for these shirts? I can cut the long white sleeves off and turn the shirts into t-shirts. I've done this to another shirt of his that was like this (I bought it during the summer because the t-shirt part was really cute, but didn't want him running around in the hot weather with a long-sleeve shirt on). That shirt turned out fine and you really can't know that it was originally a long sleeve shirt. It hasn't frayed or anything. Should I just do that? I'd rather try to get the stains out one or two more times before cutting the sleeves.
OneAndDone - Usually anything that can get messy... Pretty much every meal since he's 2... His shirt comes off. Hubby knows this. Yet for some reason forgot to do it when I wasn't there to enforce this rule. Arg! And trust me... I would have rather not been sick. Icky stomache flu
Fels Naptha.
It's a big bar of soap found in the laundry aisle. Works better than any stain treatment out there.
Just wet the garment and rub the bar into the spot until you've worked a good amount of soap in. Let it hang out a little while and launder as usual.
It also gets out blood, juice, and lots of stains that you'd think were already set in. Works fabulous for ring-around-the-collar on white shirts, and get sweat stains out too.
I use Oxi Clean (it's a powder that comes in a box), and it effectively gets all my stains out for clothing. You can use it on other things, too, not just clothes. You put some of the powder in water, mix it up, let the item soak for awhile. Then you can rewash it in the machine, and the stain should be gone. For harder stains, soak longer or use more concentrated Oxi / water mix. Happy washing!
I second Christy Lee!
I use Fels Naptha on all our stains and it works wonders! We are on a well and will occasionally get iron stains on whites and Fels Naptha even works on that. I have found it at Fred Meyer and Walmart. It's like $1 for a bar.
just some advice - NEVER dry clothes if you still want hope of ever getting a stain out. That will set the stain. If you wash something and a stain is still there, let it air dry.
These shirts are called foolers. They are made to look like you have layered a short sleeve shirt under a long sleeve shirt. I have used baby oxi spray to successfully remove old stains. Cutting the sleeves off would be a good last resort option, and you could always still layer them over a long sleeve t-shirt if you want to use them in the winter.
I know what you mean with those stains. My 1 yr old has had some odd stains that could have been spaghetti but I know my husband did not feed that to him. Get the Oxi powder, wet the sleeves and sprinkle powder directly on the stain. Then let it sit for a day or so. I have been able to remove a lot of mystery stains that my 1 yr old and my 4 yr old stain magnet has had. Most of my kids clothes look new thanks to Oxy. I have also put the clothes in a little water with a scoop. you could do this with jsut the sleeves and leave for a few days. Even with dryer set stains, i have been able to get out or to the point you can only see it if you look really hard.
I recently purchased a laundry stain stick from Black Kettle Soap Company on Etsy. I tried it out on my oven mitts that were really stained up (they have been thru the washer and dryer several times and were still stained). After using the stain stick once, the stains were almost completely gone. After using it a second time, the stains were gone. These oven mitts are 8+ years old so I am sure some of the stains were about that old too.
Oxiclean.
I also use H2 from Shaklee with their stain-treatment powder. It will get anything out - formula from 2 years ago, blood, even if it's been through the dryer. The downside is that you have to order it online.
Good luck.
I use Carbona products for tough stains. You find them in the laundry isle at the grocery store - they are specific to stains - chocolate, ink, oil, perspiration, etc. they are usually on the top shelf and are bright yellow bottles.
If you have already dried the garments? It might be too late. But if you love the garment - then I would try using the Carbona products with those particular stains.
Good luck!
Shout works great for me but for really stubborn stains I use 2 parts peroxide one part Dawn dishwashing soap in a spray bottle. Shake well and wait for it to turn clear. Then spray on stain and let it soak for a bit before washing. I've used this on coffee stains on hubby's shirts AFTER I washed and dried them when he says oh by the way ...
Drying sets the stain, so your best bet at this point is to try a bit of straight bleach on a toothbrush and scrub the stain before rehashing. Sometimes bleach will leave a yellow mark, but if you're already thinking of cutting the sleeves off, it can't hurt to try.
I keep a bottle of Dreft Spray in each child's room and another in the laundry room. I spray stains before putting them into the laundry basket and again before putting into the washer, then check before drying. In 3.5 years, with 2 kids, I've only had 3 things that were ruined due to stains.
Good luck!
Fels Napatha -- just worked on getting all the ick out of little one's red coat after she fell in a parking garage into a puddle of water, and whatever else was in it (it was full of black grit, too).... After lathering coat up well with the bar and rinsing it, I also sprayed it w/Spray-n-wash as extra help!
If it's white - you can try Windex type stuff ....
The regular powder oxi-clean works the best. Stains that have been through the dryer are tough, but not impossible. Keep trying with the powder oxi...I know, spagetti sauce is the worst.
I don't know if this would work for spaghetti stains or not, but here's a trick I use with my daughters' ballet tights (the feet always get SO dirty, almost black if they wear them with their tap shoes... ugh!).
Anyway, use bar soap - Ivory if you have it - and scrub the item under warm water. I get the item wet, then apply the soap directly to the fabric, then scrub the fabric on itself, rinse, and repeat. This method has eliminated many awful stains for me.
I don't what to do for you now, but in the future, when this happens again :) I LOVE Shout Advanced for Set In Stains. When something is stained, as long as I spray it within 12 hours, and let it set for at least a few hours but up to a few days, there's not a stain I've found yet that this stuff couldn't remove.
It probably won't save your spaghetti shirts, though...sorry. :( Once a stain has been washed and really set in, I think it's pretty much a lost cause.
My daughter spilled fruit punch on her white shirt. We were out, so I wiped up what I could and it dried by the time we got home. I put it in a bucket of water with some borax. (Enough water to cover the shirt and about a 1/4 cup of borax.) In an hour the stain was almost completely gone. I left it there over night and it was all clean in the morning.
Did you try Tide straight onto the stain?
Other than that, original (blue) Dawn gets about everything out.
But you've already washed (& I assume, dried) them.
Might be a losing battle.
I've been known to make mine change shirts on pasta nights!
How dare you get sick? Lol
I usually just load the stained area with Tide liquid detergent and wrap it in a plastic grocery bag and leave it for a few hours. After that put it in the wash. When the washer is finished, I check for the stain. If it's still there, I repeat the process only leaving the shirt in the bag for a longer time frame, before washing it again. I understand your pain, I feel that chocolate and spaghetti are the hardest stains to get out of clothes. Try not to put the clothes into the dryer again until the stain is out, the dryer sets it in.
