3 Simple Laundry Tips

For some reason I always end up ruining my "cool" clothes. I'm not very stylish. Every time I buy something that approaches being stylish, I ruin it. Well, "ruin" is a relative term...especially since the advent of blogging and Pinterest.

So, I decided I was not going to end up trashing the few "cool" clothes I had just because I had "ruined" them somehow. I hopped on the Internet and decided there had to be a way to rescue my poor articles of clothing. Here's what I found. I hope it helps you as much as it helped me!

Laundry Disaster #1: Shrinking a brand-new shirt.

I'm sure most women have shrunken at least one article of clothing in their day. My mother is queen of shrinkage. Once she shrunk my favorite wool sweater. Conveniently, it fit her afterwards. In this particular case, I accidentally washed this brand-new shirt in hot water. It was so little afterwards, I wanted to cry. I was determined not to give up. Here's what I decided to do:

1. Put on shrunken shirt while still wet. Tug on it to make it stretch to fit a little better.
2. Hang up shrunken shirt on a plastic hanger.
3. Match up the bottom of the shirt and LOTS of clothespins to the bottom. This will weight the shirt down, resulting in stretching.
4. Let air dry.

This really worked for me. I've since worn this shirt several times. I've also found that this shirt tends to shrink whenever it gets wet, so I've used this method again to ensure it stretches back to the correct size.

Laundry Disaster #2: Grease stains.

I usually wear aprons when I cook, but every once in a while I'll be in a hurry and won't wear one. It always seems to be when I'm browning ground beef. Last summer, I "ruined" one of my favorite shirts when grease spattered up from some ground beef I was cooking up. I hadn't been able to wear the shirt all summer and was about to throw it out this spring, when I decided to try to rescue it one last time. I found some ideas on Pinterest, but didn't really like the methods. So, I branched out and found some ideas on an ancient, slightly tacky bulletin board type website. Even though it's not the most attractive website, it had some AWESOME ideas. I decided to try Dawn Power Dissolve dishwashing spray (you can find this in the dish soap aisle at Wal-Mart).

1. Spray grease spots with Dawn Power Dissolve.
2. Throw sprayed article of clothing in washer and wash on normal cycle with regular detergent.
3. While wet, check to see if you missed any grease spots. If you have, spray again and re-wash.
4. Air dry.

This worked the first time! I didn't even know this spray existed. A word of caution: I tried using it on my non-stick electric skillet. Bad idea. It took off some of the non-stick finish. I've also tried using some of my husband hand goop that he uses to clean his hands after working on the car. I spilled some homemade ice-cream on the same shrunken shirt, and the hand goop took it right out. It did say it was safe for laundry stains, so make sure you find a hand goop that is laundry-safe.

Laundry Disaster #3: Whites accidentally turned pink.

I recently bought an expensive camisole that sucks in your stomach. It works really well (and also prevents natural breathing). What I like most about it is how high the neckline is. So many camisoles are too low for my tastes. Somehow, a pair of my husband's pajama pants bled onto this camisole and turned it a pale pink. This happened in the laundry basket somehow before I even threw it in the wash. I wouldn't care normally, but I do want this camisole to show sometimes when the neckline of my overshirt is too low. I wasn't really keen on bleaching it, because that weakens the fabric. After an Internet search, I found out that Rit (you, know the dye company) makes a little color remover product (can't remember where this info came from). I think it's meant for accidentally dyed clothing or for preparing another article of clothing for dyeing. I found this product in the laundry section of Wal-Mart right by the other Rit color dyes. Basically, all you have to do is follow the instructions on the back of the box. It didn't work perfectly, but it is a little better. I think it will still be wearable in public (under something else). I would show you a before/after picture, but this all happened before my new camera became such a wonderful part of my life. You can't really tell a difference in the pictures, so I thought it would be pointless to post them.

I know there are many different remedies for all of these "disasters." These are just some of the ones that worked for me. Feel free to comment with more laundry tips and tricks!