CRAYONS IN THE DRYER? help!!

[tammylsmith]

Ok, I just discovered that a green and a red crayon went though a dryer load and completely ruined that load. Our whole dryer is marked up red and green now and I don't know how to get it off. I am afraid to send any more clothes through the dryer because I don't want them to be all marked up. Any suggestions?

[Mama2Bug]

I have no idea if this will work, but maybe if you sent a dry load of rags through on high, the crayon would kind of melt off onto them instead of your dryer....

[ErikaG]

Originally Posted by tammylsmith

Ok, I just discovered that a green and a red crayon went though a dryer load and completely ruined that load. Our whole dryer is marked up red and green now and I don't know how to get it off. I am afraid to send any more clothes through the dryer because I don't want them to be all marked up. Any suggestions?

If anyone's going to know how to remove crayon, it's a crayon manufacturer, right?

I have http://www.crayola.com/canwehelp/staintips/guide.cfm bookmarked-it's Crayola's stain removal page. Nearly 500 pages of stain removal tips for various Crayola products, including crayons, from various materials. You'll have to do some searching-I don't know which page specifically tells you how to remove them from the dryer, but that would be where I'd start.

[Tigerchild]

First, you may be able to save the load of clothes that went through.

I've had good results from washing (not drying!) the clothes about 6-7 times in a row (with a 60 minute or longer soak between each one) with lots of oxyclean. There's no change the first 4 times or so, but then things start to come out.

As far as getting it out of the dryer--where are the marks concentrated? All over the drum, or are there just several there and a lot of melted crayon near the edges and door?

The first thing you probably want to do is to unplug your dryer, and then take a blunt plastic knife (if you have any children's cutlery knives, they are good for this) and scrape off as much of the cooled, solified crayon as you can. Then mist down the drum and wipe away the crayon shavings with rags/paper towels. After that, it might be useful to get out a Magic Eraser (those Mr. Clean things). You probably want to use gloves since they can be really abrasive to your skin, and be sure to keep an eye on whether or not it's damaging the pain on the drum. Another alternative would be to use a scrubby sponge, but that will take a lot of elbow grease to get it done. Keep misting the drum with water and wiping it out. If it's a really bad case where the crayons weren't caught by the lint filter or didn't settle in the door and instead were totally melted into the drum...I hate to break it to you but it might be a couple-day project.

After you've gotten rid of almost all of the visible thick residue, get your household rags, moisten them up with hot water, and run the dryer on high (maybe with some extra towels that you don't care about). Hopefully the last of the residue will come off on the towels, but after you get the towels/rags out, unplug the dryer again and scrape and wipe again, since whatever's left will be softened. And then repeat, as necessary.

I'm soo sorry. Cleaning up dryer crayons is something I hate, I've done it multiple times though. You'll get a free workout for arms and abs, at least, but...man, what a pain. I'm sorry.

[Anastasiya]

I second the oxyclean. I re-wet all the ruined clothes, put oxyclean on each crayon spot/smear, and took a soft toothbrush and scrubbed it in. I was able to save every single thing - and this was with red and black crayons.

[Miasmamma]

I was going to say that for the dryer, I just used my hairdryer and a microfiber towel. The heat from the hairdryer melted the crayon and the towel wiped it clean. I second the PP's for re-washing the clothes. I've gotten purple crayon out of a load of whites just by re-washing a few times.

[Boodah'smama]

i can help!!

About 2 years ago we had a purple crayon go through the wash in the bib of ds's overalls. it was a mess and a very full load of laundry--most of which were practically brand new clothes from children's place and i was determined to save them. i'm a fairly chemical free, crunchy mama when it comes to laundry/cleaning products, so this was not my ideal, but it totally worked!

you need to spray WD40 on all of the crayon spots, then scrub them with a scrub brush and lots of Dawn dish detergent. let it sit and then wash in the washing maching.

As for the dryer drum, WD40 on a rag, and just scrub it out. i followed by doing the same with just water after. Our drum is still a lovely tint of purple but all the wax streaks are gone and it never transferred to another load.

Good luck!!!

[aua(TM)?lait]

[tinyblackdot]

There was just a post about this on another forum.

My mom said that you iron the clothes with a towel under them and a brown paper bag over them...and the crayon will transfer to the paper.

The mama on the other forum used wd40 and got it all out of her diapers.

Best of luck!

[dubfam]

I have not had this happen yet, but I am sure with 2 kids it will.
I am sorry and I hope you can get the stains out. I hate when something like that goes through the wash.