Fend Off Wrinkles and Stains with These Laundry Hacks
Saturday, August 21, 2010 by Laura Schluckebier 
Make laundry day suck a little less. Image courtesy of Flickr user dotbenjamin. Licensed under CC 2.0 BY-SA.It is a most unfortunate event when I wake up on a Thursday morning only to discover the dress I was planning on wearing has a big, ugly grease stain or that my last clean shirt is bundled up at the bottom of my dresser drawer. I have a zero tolerance policy for unwearable clothes-- If you are wrinkled or stained, you will be forever banished to the back of my closet because, honestly, who wants to fuss with ironing and dry cleaners? Not me. Thankfully, I've found even more laundry hacks have helped me take care of my clothes without taking up much of my time or money.
For stains that won't come out in a normal wash cycle, go ahead and invest in a bottle of Shout. It won't discolor your clothes like bleach can and it will get out most stains. Just spray it on the stain in question, rub it in a little bit, let it sit for a few minutes, and then toss it in and wash it with everything else in the washer either with your own store brand detergent or your homemade detergent. Piece of cake. For the more stubborn grease stains which are notoriously hard to get out even with Shout, try using a bit of Palmolive or any other grease-fighting dish soap, like Dawn. You should have some around, especially if you keep dishes in your room. Since dish soap is designed to get grease off dishes, it'll also get the grease out of your clothes. Just squirt a little soap on, rub it in, let it sit, and toss it in the wash with the rest of your clothes.
The only thing I hate more than stains are wrinkles. Because I usually end up stuffing my T-shirts into drawers instead of folding them up nice and neat as I should, I have to suffer with the occasional wrinkled shirt. Hands down, one of the best things I have ever bought in college is Downy Wrinkle Releaser. Slide the shirt onto a hanger and simply spray the desired wrinkled shirt with the Wrinkle Releaser, give it a good shake, maybe lay it flat and smooth the wrinkles out for a bit, let it hang for maybe five or ten minutes, and the wrinkles should have disappeared from the shirt.
Button-down shirts can be de-wrinkle-fied with Downy Wrinkle Releaser too, but if you really want them to look sharp, this next method works better. In lieu of an iron, the best way to get a nice shirt looking like it's been pressed is to get it when it's come right out of the dryer. But if you are like me and forget about your laundry for about four hours, this usually isn't going to happen. However, what you can do is throw your shirt back into the dryer along with a wet hand towel and dryer sheet. It doesn't need to be sopping wet, but run it under the faucet for a bit, and wring it out just so it's not dripping everywhere before you throw it into the dryer. Turn the dryer on high for about ten minutes (maybe more, maybe less depending on how awesome your dryer is) and hang the shirt up or put it on right away so it doesn't get wrinkled again. This method of de-wrinkling also works great for slacks that should be pressed.
Do you have any clothing hacks that have made your life easier? Let us know in the comments.
Reader Comments (3)
Remove wrinkles by hanging your (dress) shirt in the shower while you are showering the steam will unwrinkle the shirt and refresh it at the same time...
What's also great is that when your university's laundry machines don't realize that there's a new load being loaded and you can get two for one.
In fact, I just did that. Free laundry FTW.
Though, karma may have bit me in the ass since the tea I bought from the vending machine got stuck. >_>
I have never used the wrinkle releaser but I am definitely going to get one for this year back at school. Thanks for the tips! I always read your posts and I thought you might like this one as well that I came across http://blog.oppapers.com/you-know-youre-in-college-when/