Hi! One day last week or the week before, my babysitter told my husband that one of the other children spilled juice all over my son. They changed his clothes, rinsed the juice covered clothes in water, wrung them out and stuck them in a plastic bag. Well, somehow that plastic bag got kicked underneath a chair at some point and I just found it yesterday evening. Needless to say, the cute little Texas Ranger's onesie and shorts were all moldy/mildewy when I saw them in the still moist plastic bag. I know Shout stick and the dual action stain remover from Spray and Wash won't work. I've tried toothbrush and tide and while I can get pretty much any stain out of my carpet and couch upholstery with baking soda and water (a.k.a. cheap version of club soda), it's not put a dent in these mold/mildew stains. I even put the clothes in my washer which has a special "stain remover" cycle that agitates and soaks over a period of a couple of hours to help loosen the stains, along with the baking soda, to no avail. I'm thinking I'll just have to throw the clothes away. But before I do, I thought I'd check to see if any of you know of any magical potion that has worked for you at getting out these kind of stains. The outfit is red & blue cotton knit, so bleach is out of the question. Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer. :-)
Soak almost anything in a bucket with BIZ bleach for a day or two and it will come out clean. Good luck!
Oxi clean laundry stain remover works great and you can also try borax. It gets out stains and smells just add it with your laundry detergent. Clorox bleach for colors may also work too and it won't ruin the colors on the clothes and I soak my girls school uniforms with the Clorox for colors for 30 min and then I do a regular wash adding my detergent.
One advice that I got if a piece of clothing has a stain on it after it has gone through the wash do not put it in the dryer cause it will set the stain in the outfit.
Oxi-clean gets out everything. Follow the instructions on the container for pre-soaking. I soaked some well-stained hand-me-down clothes for about 6 hours before washing and they look brand new now.
I use a stain remover called Sol-u-mel. It has gotten out some crazy looking and smelling stains for me, including mold & mildew. It gets rid of the stinky smell too!
My daughter threw up in our car last Christmas and we had to bag up her clothes and it stayed in our car for several days and got very molded. I soaked it in Oxyclean for a day and every bit of it came out. She had black colored mold on a white Christmas t-shirt. After the mold had cleaned out of it, I then bleached it to freshen it and make the shirt bright white again.
Hi N.!
Just FYI - I have never been able to make OXY work for me, but I must be doing something wrong because everyone else I know LOVES IT! However, last case before you toss the outfit...if nothing else works... If the stains are only on the white portion of the outfit, you can use the Clorox Bleach pen on the stains directly. Let it sit for about an hour and then rinse under cold water REALLY WELL. Then put it in the wash on the HOT cycle and the stains will be gone. If the stains are on the colored portion of the outfit, I think you can use the new TIDE pen the same way, but you will want to check for color fading on a small part of the "inside hem" to make sure it won't fade first.
Hope that helps! :)
I have been using the new bleach for colored clothes. It works wonderfully! Give it a try.
This will sound strange, but try soaking it overnight in buttermilk and then washing it. I used that trick on my son's clothes and it would get out mildew, stains, and even those pesky spit-up stains. It also helps eliminate the smell. My MIL gave me the tip when I was close to throwing out several outfits.
Hi N.,
Try Biz in hot water. You may have to let the garmet soak several hours but it works wonders.
S.
Hi N.,
Try Oxyclean--it works wonders!
Thank you so much for posting your question! Our trash just went out today with a cute shirt of my daughter's in it, because the shirt got moldy in much the same way as your son's outfit. I'll certainly save the advice you received for future mold problems!
A.
Hi there.
I sell vintage clothes on line and often get clothes with stains, rust, mildew, smells, grass stains and other unknown stains. I use this stuff called Lava soap. My husband is a mechanic and this is the stuff that I used on his work clothes. I can't use Oxi-clean b/c it makes me feel itchy all over and I too could never really get it to work for me either.
