Stain Removal Help Please!

[Annie Mac]

I'm to the point where I'm just going to go buy a bottle of Resolve or something. How do you all keep clothes relatively (I'm not asking for perfection here) stain free? Blueberries, bananas, avocadoes...I think I might need something commercial, because the vinegar/detergent/borax combos I've worked with are just not cutting it. Recommendations? 

[Denvergirlie]

Dawn dish soap... I keep a bottle in my laundry room and pre-treat stains/ spots with basic dishwashing liquid, works great on "oily" stains, haven't ever had any staining issues from foods you mentioned above, but worth a try.

[Annie Mac]

Thanks! I'll try it for the oily stuff. Is there something different about Dawn than other dish soaps? I've noticed that people specify that brand a lot. Would my regular dish soap not work?

[Llyra]

Your regular dish liquid will work if it's relatively free of "extra" ingredients. I use dish liquid on all kinds of oily stains.

Have you tried Oxi-clean? I put a scoop of the free-and-clear version in each load, and it really seems to help. Our clothes get way cleaner than they did before I started using it.

[Annie Mac]

I've been such a purist, I haven't tried anything other than detergent & borax. I'll try oxi clean.

[go_blue]

Bio-Kleen's Bac-Out works pretty wello

[littlehoneybee]

Oxy Clean in a bucket.  I let the clothes soak for a few days if necessary and this works most of the time.  For tomato stains, I prefer Kids n Pets.  It's found near the carpet cleaners at Wal Mart and it works great on clothes too.

[artemis33]

Originally Posted by littlehoneybee 

Oxy Clean in a bucket.  I let the clothes soak for a few days if necessary and this works most of the time.  For tomato stains, I prefer Kids n Pets.  It's found near the carpet cleaners at Wal Mart and it works great on clothes too.

That is what I do.  I use a plastic dish pan in my utility sink.   I personally haven't found putting the Oxyclean right in the load of laundry to be very helpful, but if I mix it stong and soak the stained clothes overnight or longer if needed, it works very well.  Usually I pretreat with the Oxyclean 'power gel' stuff first and run it through a regular load.  Often this is enough.  If not, I soak with the powder.

This is the gel stuff.  I like it better than the spray partly because you can leave it on the stain for a couple of days until you wash the load if you need to.

http://www.oxiclean.com/pre-treatment/Products/oxiclean-max-force-gel-stick.aspx

[janinemh]

For berry stains,  pour boiling water through them as soon as possible and it should get rid of it.   I love bac-out too and sometimes use Oxy-clean

[sugarlumpkin]

I'd also recommend Bac-Out and Oxyclean. For berries I'd try Oxyclean (which is a brand name for oxygen bleach) first.

[Annie Mac]

Thanks Mamas. It's been horribly cold here, so I've just been concentrating on keeping warm, but as soon as I'm back to laundry (which will be soon) I'll give these things a shot. For sure I can get oxy-clean, not sure I've ever seen bac-out this side of the border though.