Xpost Let's talk bibs

[epdeans]

I have a son who is just beginning to eat food. We are trying bananas, avocados, and sweet potatoes. He loves them all.

This leads to me having dirty stain prone bibs. What do you do to get the stains out of your bibs? I am open to either store bought or a make my own stain remover.

Next question, how do you wash velcro closure bibs without destroying your child's other knit clothes added to the wash? I washed a load of my son's clothes this am and one of his knit onesies came out with about 10 small holes in the fabric. I feel like the holes were made by the velcro from the bibs snagging them during the wash cycle.

Thanks for reading,
Elizabeth in NC

[BetsyS]

I switched to different styles of bibs. I like tie bibs, because even after a toddler can pull them off, it's a lot harder to untie them.

I have a few plasticy bibs (they feel like fabric that is laminated or something--hard to describe) that don't stain. And, I also have a few bibs made out of terry cloth towel-like fabric, and they also don't really stain.

However, I'm on baby #3, and I just threw out all the nasty bibs from baby #1 before I got better bibs. All those bibs that are fairly small, sold in the baby aisle at Target? Those worked terribly for us.

[ChetMC]

No Bibs

We don't use bibs.

I found that when stuff was messy enough to be a real problem, it was likely to get all over (shirt sleeves, dropped in the lap, etc). So when I have a 10 month old self-feeding spaghetti, they tend to eat in a diaper and go in the tub afterward. I also found that normal mess, like a gob of squished banana or whatever, just washed out of the kids' clothes.

If we did use bibs though, I wouldn't worry about stains on them. Something does not need to be pristine if its purpose is just to catch mess.

I also wouldn't wash bibs with clothes. I'd probably wash them with dish towels and other utility laundry.

Oxyclean or any other oxygen booster works really well on food stains. It does well on anything organic.

[dizzysmom]

Originally Posted by ChetMC

We don't use bibs.

I found that when stuff was messy enough to be a real problem, it was likely to get all over (shirt sleeves, dropped in the lap, etc). So when I have a 10 month old self-feeding spaghetti, they tend to eat in a diaper and go in the tub afterward.

We've only used a bib a handful of times, and it is usually when we are out and about with DD and aren't able to hose her down afterward. DD is a pretty messy eater and almost always gets food all over herself, and she likes to rub her dirty hands in her hair Plus the last few times we've tried to get her to use one she spends her whole meal pulling it off. We just use OxyClean and those Tide stain-release boosters to prevent too much damage to her clothes.

[jennlyn]

I only needed one bib for each of my kids- it was called a "Roo" bib- shaped plastic with a curved up section on the bottom that looked like a trough. It caught any food or liquid that they spilled. I didn't have any problems getting them used to wearing it and it saved me from having to do major stain removal on their clothes.

[treeoflife3]

I use bibs made with washrag material and rinse them in cold water on high pressure immediately. That resolves most any stain we might incur.

As for velcro, I just velcro them back together before I put them in the wash... I rarely wash bibs with clothes anyway... usually just other towels and junk.

I agree that the use of a bib is pointless for the truly messy stuff.. it will get EVERYWHERE the bib isn't... so our kiddo eats in just a diaper too. I still use the bib however because it cuts down just a bit on the mess and she hates being wiped off so any little bit helps! I just rinse it off in cold water when she is done eating, and then it is already wet to finish washing her off (hence the wash rag material cuts down on what I get dirty!) and one more rinse in cold and its ready to be washed.

Otherwise, I don't worry about stains. I figure they are for catching everything I don't want staining OTHER stuff... might as well be the bib then!

[mumkimum]

I had 1 or 2 of the plasticy velcro bibs with dd - I'd often just spray them with all purpose cleaner and wipe with a kitchen rag. If I wanted to toss them in the washer I put the velcro together or would put in a delicates bag with other stuff - if you're wanting to wash with clothes I'd do that.

I liked the towel bibs best too - easiest to put in the wash and not worry about.

[zebra15]

WHEN Ds was little I washed the bibs with the towels. I also kept them velcro-ed. They also had bibs that you just pulled over his head and I liked those because he couldnt pull them off hehe