For strawberry stains, start by blotting away any excess (if the stain is fresh) and then rinse the stain with cold water.  What you do next depends on the color and fiber content of the item with the stain on it.                                                       

For white, bleachable items (always avoid bleaching wool, silk, mohair, leather and spandex) apply Clorox® Bleach Pen® Gel to the stained area right before laundering, and then wash immediately in the hottest water recommended on the care label using detergent and ¾ cup Clorox® Regular- Bleach.  Air dry the item and check for success.  If any stain remains, repeat the treatment.  You want to avoid tumble drying in a hot dryer until you know the stain is all the way out.  This is important to avoid heat setting any residual stain so you can’t get it all the way out with a second treatment.

For colored items (or white items that include a small amount of spandex, for example), apply Liquid Clorox 2® Stain Fighter & Color Booster directly to the stain and rub in.  Wait 3-5 minutes, and then wash in warmest water recommended using detergent and more Clorox 2®.  Air dry and check for success, and if necessary repeat the treatment.

A: It sounds like the white shirt may actually not be as white as it used to be; fabrics can become dingy over time when washed in cold or lukewarm water, especially if you have hard water.  You should be able to unify the appearance of the rest of the shirt with an overnight presoak.  To do this, add a capful (filled to line 1) of liquid Clorox2® Stain Fighter & Color Booster to 2 gallons of very hot water and mix.  Add the shirt and make sure it is fully submerged – weigh it down with a dishwasher safe plate if necessary – and let the shirt soak overnight.  The next day, wash the shirt in the hottest water recommended on the care label using detergent and more Clorox2®.  This should catch the rest of the shirt up to the treated spot.

Something else to consider (especially if the presoak doesn’t unify the shirt’s appearance) is how long the liquid Clorox2® was on the fabric before the shirt was washed.  With pretreating, you want to allow enough time for concentrated product to work effectively at remove a tough stain, but not enough time for the brighteners and blue colorant to permanently dye the fabric.  Contact time for a pretreatment should be limited to 5-10 minutes, and the product should never be allowed to dry out on fabric.  If that is what’s happened in your case, then you still could try to unify the color by soaking the shirt in a more concentrated soaking solution.

A: There are different treatment options depending on the type of fabric the cushions are made of (polyester, cotton, etc.) and brand. If they are made by Sunbrella®, there is great cleaning information on their website, which you can check out at http://www.sunbrella.com/cleaning/upholstery.php. Note that for general mildew removal on machine launderable textiles, we recommend a solution of ¼ cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach per gallon of water.  Items should be fully submerged for 5 minutes, and then rinsed before finishing up with a hot water wash using detergent + 3/4 cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach.  Sunbrella® recommends a more concentrated bleach solution for mildew removal, which actually matches our recommendation for mildew removal on exterior surfaces like vinyl siding.  Since Sunbrella® fabrics are 100% polyester (which has a high resistance to bleach) this makes sense. 

For non-Sunbrella® fabrics, as long as they are 100% polyester the same solution should still be suitable; I would just test a hidden part of the cushion first to be sure the fabric won’t be damaged by a bleach solution.  To do that, apply add 2 teaspoons Clorox® Regular-Bleach to ¼ cup water and apply a drop of the solution to a hidden part of the cushion.  Make sure the drop soaks into the fabric.  Wait 1 minute and then blot dry.  No color change means the cushions can be safely bleached.

Has anyone else discovered mold on their outdoor furniture?  The warmer spring weather is finally letting us use our backyards and patios!

A. I would start by pretreating the stain with something to help solubilize the cooking oil, breaking it up to make it easier to remove.  Try liquid Clorox2® Stain Fighter and Color Booster or liquid dishwashing detergent.  Apply a little and rub it into the stain, and wait 10 minutes (but don’t let it sit too long or dry out on the fabric).  How you proceed next depends on the item.  Here are some options for different color types and fabric:

If the t-shirt is white and bleachable (avoid bleaching wool, silk, mohair, leather, and spandex) then wash it in the hottest water recommended on the care label using detergent and 3/4 cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach.  Air dry and check for success – hopefully the stain will be gone. If a little remains you can repeat the treatment with a decent chance of eventual success; if the t-shirt has been kept out of a hot dryer.

If the t-shirt is colored, then wash in the hottest water recommended on the care label using detergent and more Clorox2®.  Again, be sure to air dry the shirt and then check for success, and repeat the treatment if necessary.

A: Most garments that are new bleed a little, but usually they stop after a few cycles, so washing newer items alone or only with like colors is an effective strategy for limiting dye transfer.  To restore items that have picked up fugitive color during the wash cycle, you can often do this with a bleach soaking solution as long as the items are safely bleachable.  First, check the care labels and don’t use the soaking solution if the item contains wool, silk, mohair, spandex, and leather–these should never be bleached.  Also, depending on whether your items are white, another color or a combination of colors, you may need to check for colorfastness to bleach with a simple bleachability test:  dilute 2 teaspoons Clorox® Regular-Bleach in ¼ cup water; apply a drop of this solution to a hidden part of the each item (like a hem, cuff, collar, or inside seam); wait 1 minute then blot dry; no color change means the item can be safely bleached.

For items that are not on the “avoid bleaching” list and pass the bleachablility test, try a bleach soak:  fully submerge the item in a solution of ¼ cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach diluted in 1 gallon cool water for up to 5 minutes, then rinse thoroughly.  Air dry the item, and check for success (it’s important to keep the item out of the dryer so the heat doesn’t set any remaining dye).  Hopefully the fugitive color will be gone, but if it is lighter, then repeat the bleach soak again.  However, if the bleach soak leaves the dye transfer color unchanged, then you may need to try RIT® Color Remover, which can usually be found at drug and hardware stores.  A dilute RIT® solution works best to limit stripping off the original color of an item in addition to the fugitive dye, so be careful.

A:  Congratulations on the new member of your family, dogs are a wonderful addition!  If the comforter is white and made with synthetic fill, simply wash it in hot water using detergent and ¾ cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach.  If it’s colored, you still may be able to bleach it depending on what dye was used.  You can check for colorfastness with a quick bleachability test.  To do this, add 2 teaspoons bleach to ¼ cup water and apply a drop of the solution to a hidden part of the comforter (be sure to test all colors).  Wait 1 minute, then blot dry.  No color change means the item can be safely bleached, and you can wash it as described above. 

However, if the comforter is down-filled, or the fabric does not pass the bleachability test, then you can wash the comforter with Clorox2® Stain Fighter and Color Booster.  Begin by pretreating the stain with a little liquid Clorox2® – apply it directly to the stain and rub in, allow it to sit for 5 minutes and then wash in hot water using detergent and more Clorox2®.  Air dry and check for success—repeat the treatment if necessary.  Air drying is good if you can—the cover should dry faster than the fill so just let it air dry long enough to make sure the stain is out, and then finish drying the comforter in a hot dryer (this is important to avoid the comforter mildewing). 

Another great tip is to include some clean tennis balls when transferring the comforter into the dryer.  This helps bounce the loft back into the comforter!  You may also want to consider taking the comforter to a launder mat for drying if your dryer is small and won’t allow it to fluff all the way out. 

Does anyone else have puppy or kitten stain that need to be removed?

A:  Ideally a beverage spill can be immediately blotted and then rinsed with water to reduce the amount of stain needing to be removed.  However, that’s much more difficult to do with carpet.  A stain that sits for a while will make it even more difficult to remove.  You may want to try Formula 409® Carpet Spot & Stain Remover on it. 

If it turns out that the red colorant in the soda really needs an oxidant to fully remove the satin, you could also try Clorox2® Laundry Stain Remover, which comes in a spray bottle and includes hydrogen peroxide in the formula.  Have a pile of towels and some warm water handy to help you work on the stain.  Spray on the stain remover and let it soak into the stain, and wait 10 minutes.  Then pour a very small amount of water onto the stain, and immediately use the towels to soak up the liquid.  Hopefully the stain will be lighter, and you can repeat this until you work the stain out.  When you are finished, it is very important to have the area cleaned with a carpet cleaning machine to fully extract all the cleaning agents you applied.  Otherwise, in time you will likely end up with a dirty spot where you removed the stain because residual stain removers become dirt magnets.  Also, if your carpet is older, you may end up with a very clean spot relative to the rest of the carpet so you may need to have the entire carpet cleaned.

A:  The problem you have is similar to cleaning dried latex paint off a brush with synthetic (nylong or polyester) bristles.  With brushes, you can easily soak them in a solvent for an extended period of time; unfortunately, you cannot safely adapt this technique to clean your jacket.  The solvents used by painters for this purpose are flammable, and fabrics (i.e. rags) that are used for applying or wiping up paint solvents should NEVER go into a clothes washer or dryer due to the risk of spontaneous combustion.  Appliance manufacturers include warnings to this effect in the user’s guide and on the machines themselves because this is such a big safety issue.

However, I did find one website that mentions a method for using a liquid fabric softener + water solution for cleaning paintbrushes, and you can read about it here:  http://nwrenovation.com/painting-articles/paint-brushes-101/ .  Scroll down to the section on cleaning brushes, and hopefully this will work for you.

Paint stains can certainly be pesky!  Do any of my readers have any tricks or tips for removing paint from clothing?

A:  The most effective way to remove gum from just about anything is to use ice cubes to freeze the gum, and then gently scrape away the hardened chunks with a dull knife.  Just put the ice directly onto the gum.  As you are waiting for the gum to harden, the ice will melt as you hold it there so plan on using multiple ice cubes.  It would also be good to hold a towel nearby to absorb water that collects or drips away.  Be sure to freeze the gum long enough, so you don’t scratch your sofa!  When it’s thoroughly frozen, the gum will scrape away easily.

A:  Smelly towels usually indicate that there is soil build-up inside the inner workings of your clothes washer that harbors odor-causing bacteria.  The odors transfer from the washer to your laundry, and it is particularly noticeable on towels once they get wet.  Here are some tips that should help with the problem:

1. Clean out your washer.  Run an empty washer through a clean-out cycle with hot water and ¾ cup Clorox® Regular-Bleach (or fill dispenser to the “max fill” line).  Select the extra rinse option if your machine offers this; otherwise run an extra rinse cycle when the first cycle is complete.  Depending on how bad the build-up is, it might take running several clean-out cycles with bleach to fully clean the washer.  To keep the problem from coming back, run a clean out cycle with bleach once a month.  Washing at least one white load with bleach per week will also help.
2. Check your towels for bleach colorfastness.  Some colored towels can be safely bleached.  To find out if yours can, perform a quick bleachability test:  add 2 teaspoons Clorox® Regular-Bleach to ¼ cup water; apply a small drop to a hidden part of the towel, such as under the care label; wait 1 minute then rinse and blot dry; no color change means you can safely bleach the towel.  If your towels pass, wash them with detergent and 3/4 cup bleach (or fill the dispenser to the max fill line), and that should eliminate the odor causing bacteria on the towels.  You can also just add them to your white load along with your other bleachables.  Doing this on a regular basis will help keep the odor under control.
3. Always wash towels in hot water.  The hotter the water, the better the cleaning.  This is especially important for towels that can’t be bleached!
4. Dry towels immediately.  Any item that sits around damp is providing the optimum environment for mildew growth.  Transfer your towels to the dryer immediately following the wash cycle.  Be sure to select enough drying time so that towels dry completely, too.

This makes me realize that summer is just around the corner!  What stains or problems plague your summer items after storing them throughout the winter?