How to Get Mineral Stains Out of Your Clothes

How to Get Mineral Stains Out of Your Clothes!

Holy Cannoli sometimes I feel like the Universe is against me. Okay, maybe not really, but it’s been one of those weeks. I had a few MAJOR projects fails, and a few technical difficulties with the memory card with ALL of my pictures on it. So, needless to say, it’s been a little bit of a frustrating week.

Part of my frustration is laundry. When we bought our house, my husband did not want to put in a water softener, because he hates the way soft water tastes and feels. He was very passionate about his desire to skip that feature, so we did. After I started doing laundry in our new house mysterious stains kept popping up on ALL of our light-colored clothes. All the light-pink clothes that I bought for my girls would get weird brown stains, that they did NOT put on their clothes!

How to Get Mineral Stains Out of Your Clothes

I. WAS. TICKED.

I tried everything to get those stupid mystery stains out and NOTHING was working. Not even bleach! What the HECK! I had no idea what was going on until someone in our area mentioned that we have VERY hard water where we live. I started doing some research online and discovered that it was probably the minerals in our water that were staining our clothes.

HOW FRUSTRATING!

I’m currently demanding that we get a water softener when our budget allows, but until then I had to find a solution to our problem, because I can’t handle the stains!

Here’s an example of the stupid stains that would appear. Dark colored, random streaks. Mostly shows up on white and light pink clothes.

And now my child just called to tell me he forgot to take his Valentines to school, so pause everything!

Okay, I’m back…that was quick! Phew! I’m telling you, the universe is against me today.

Okay, so now to the stain removal.

I found the Calgon Water Softener in the laundry aisle and it promised to soften the water and brighten and whiten my clothes. I didn’t believe it at first, a lot of other products have lied to me. But I brought it home anyway because I’d try anything at that point.

At first, I was just using it on my whites. You add a cap full to your detergent dispenser and you’re good to go. I didn’t notice a huge difference at first.

Then one day, after ANOTHER BRAND NEW SHIRT got stained, I was desperate to find a solution. I tried every combo I could find on the internet, to no avail. Finally, I pulled out the Calgon and Oxi Clean and let my clothes soak in the sink for a few hours. The water actually started turning brown and disgusting. It was so satisfying.

I still didn’t believe it was doing anything, but I washed the clothes normally one more time in the washing machine after and was thinking this dress was just destined to be a ‘play’ dress from now on.

Fast forward a couple of days, when I finally got around to folding the laundry, and this dress looked new! It was a TON brighter. I was so happy! The stain was gone!

YAY!

How to Get Mineral Stains Out of Your Clothes

So here’s what I did.

1 cap full of Calgon Water Softener
1 scoop of Oxi Clean
1 sink full of hot water

Mix cleaners in hot water
Add clothes
Let them soak for an hour
Throw them in the wash to rinse them out, using Calgon and Oxi Clean again.

I bet you’d like after photos right? Well, so would I. Those are stuck on my memory card for some reason. I would tell you though, that I’m not being paid to say any of these things, so that should help you trust me.

I went to take another picture of the shirt this morning, and wouldn’t you know, it was hanging in her closet with a new ketchup stain down the front! Just my luck!