Everyday Stains on Everyday Clothing

My kids love to dig in the dirt. I love for them to dig in the dirt. I’m not terribly finicky about stained clothing. But when their school polos get so dingy that I can’t tell whether they’re “fresh from the wash” or “fresh from the digging pit,” I follow this simple routine to hit the reset button.

Before we get to the routine, check out these before and after pictures to see the level of dirt and grime I’m talking about here. I’m not talking about a small, isolated stain—a quick spot treatment may be better for that scenario. I’m talking about shirts covered in stains, front and back.

These are two representative examples of the polos from this batch.

One more preliminary note—sometimes, a particular stain calls for a particular protocol, especially if you’re dealing with a cherished or delicate item. Chemistry matters. But for everyday stains on everyday clothing, this routine does the trick for us.

Stain Treatment Protocol: Everyday Stains on Everyday Clothing

Now for the routine. These are the “ideal” steps. If you want to see just how forgiving this process can be, read the next section to learn how far I strayed from “ideal” this time, while still achieving the results above.

Stain Protocol

Step 1: Scrape off any loose crud.

Step 2: Treat particularly stained areas with a soap-and-baking-soda stain bar.

Step 3: Soak in a sodium percarbonate (oxygen bleach) solution for 8-12 hours.

Step 4: Launder as usual.

Step 5: Hang to dry in the sun.

Step 1

Scrape off the loose crud (only necessary if you are dealing with chunks of food, mud, etc.)

Step 2

Fill up a sink or basin with hot water—just enough water to cover the clothing you’re going to soak. Dunk the clothing in the basin to get the stained areas wet. Rub the particularly stained areas with a soap-and-baking-soda stain bar (alternatively, sprinkle with baking soda and rub with a bar of soap). Set the clothing aside for the moment.

Step 3

Add sodium percarbonate (oxygen bleach)* to the hot water. I never measure—I just eyeball a few tablespoons of oxygen bleach for a few inches of water in my kitchen sink. Stir with a metal kitchen utensil and allow to dissolve for a minute or two. Add the stained clothing to the hot water. Use the metal kitchen utensil or gloved hands to swish and push the clothing under water. Leave to soak for 8-12 hours.

*Do not use sodium percarbonate on silk, wool, leather, or wood.

Step 4

Using gloved hands, remove the clothing from the soak and launder as usual.

Step 5

Line dry in the sun for a few hours. This step is optional, but highly effective!

For best results, the clothes should be wet when you start the sunning (I know this to be true from experience, but I do not know why it is true—if you know, please enlighten me). If you are doing laundry at night or on a rainy day, you can hang dry them inside, and then dunk them in water and hang them outside on the next sunny day.

Less Than Perfect Execution

So that’s the ideal protocol. How far can you stray? Pretty far.

During this particular round of stain removal, I completed Steps 1 and 2 (scraped and used a stain stick), and I had begun Step 3 (soaking).

The shirts were soaking in the kitchen sink, and my intention was to leave them to soak overnight. Then I was going to transfer them to the washing machine in the morning so that they’d be ready to dry in the sun by mid-morning or early afternoon. A perfect plan.

But about 3 hours into the soak, my younger son (who isn’t quite tall enough to see down into the sink) began washing his dinner plate over the wrong side of the sink. Suddenly the clothes were soaking amidst bits of food and sauce. Not ideal.

So I cut the soak short, transferred the clothes to the washing machine, and washed them that night. I hung them to dry, but not the in sun, because it was nighttime.

The next morning, I dunked them in water, and then put them back on the clothesline to dry in the sun.

Would the results have been better if the execution had been better? Absolutely. But even the flawed execution yielded satisfactory results.

So no need to be intimidated by stain removal—for everyday stains on everyday clothes, give it a shot, and you’re likely to get decent results!