We all know that kids can ruin clothes super fast. And we also know that all those new school clothes cost plenty of money–and we aren’t looking to replace them any sooner than we have to. I have two tomato loving boys, so we know all about stains. I used to hate to let them eat tomatoes, or ketchup, or salsa, or pasta sauce….because of the stains. Then I learned this simple trick. The magic of sunshine!
My 4 year old was eating cherry tomatoes straight out of the garden, and his shirt ended up splattered in a few places. I went ahead and sprayed it with Shout just so I could show how much of the tomato remained.
The picture on the left shows the shirt straight out of the washer. Can you still see the stain? I ran into some issues getting the photos to upload and it doesn’t show the orange spots very well. They have faded but are still there. Now the cool part! Sun will bleach out tomato stains (and baby poop too). While the shirt was still wet, I sat it outside in the sun and let it dry there.
And after a few hours in the sun the shirt is dry and looks like new!
Crayola has a page dedicated to the stain removal of their products! It lets you choose which product and which surface you want to remove it from and then gives you printable instructions.
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Great tip Nik!!! I am going to do this today with my little Lily Pearls sunsuit. No more poop blowout stains for me!:)
I have done this for years. My grandmother used to do this…it’s almost like magic. It helps fade chocolate stains too. Heck, I use it on almost every stain that won’t come out in the wash.
It helps with chocolate stains! So good to know….we have a lot of those too!
nikkala-I got a baby food stain on my cream table runner-a bright orange one! I tried your tip and it worked!! thank you!
That is awesome! Thanks!
Thank you for visiting my site on Today’s Mama! I’m so glad you did because this blog is filled with one gem after another – ice cream in a bag, play doh, how to get stains out, and it is so nice to look at! I usually don’t pllogace buttons of new blogs (to me) on my blog, but I’m going to place your button on my button page. My home blog is droppedstitches72.blogspot.com ; hope to see you there!
xo Erin
My mom swears that sun is the best whitener ever. She would always hang a sheet on the front clothesline, then hang her dainties on the middle lines, and loop the sheet up to the back line. That way, her undies got nice and white without being on display to the world.