Kid Stain removing 101: The Power of Zote

I was just scrubbing out the stains out of Emma’s clothes and blanket from last night’s blowout at Target. Sigh. Did I forget to mention that somehow I had forgotten to take the diaper bag in so I had my cart with my stuff to buy in it when she started fussing (which is so unlike her) and when I picked her up I found out that she had pooped all over. I looked for the diaper bag (oops) or a diaper in my purse (oops again) with no luck so I  covered her backside up with her blanket, kept her in my arms, and tried to wrangle the four boys as I finished up the shopping (I still needed to get a few things). It was fun (ha!) Anyway, when I got home I had to get that yellow seedy poop out of her onesie, jumper and blanket—again, so much fun!
I digress though since the point of this post is to tell you how to get out the stains in case you haven’t figured it out! Stains are something that a mom of five (including 4 boys) has a lot of experience with. I realized last year that not everyone has figured out this cheap solution and awesome secret! :) It’s called Zote. It is about $1 and you can find it at Target/Wal-Mart/$ Store etc. I have tried the pink and the white and don’t see much difference (for me) so buy whatever they have. It’s worth your dollar, I promise!

Here is what I have successfully gotten out of clothing with Zote: grass stains (out of white Yankee t-ball pants!), red clay dirt (from the baseball field), old formula stains on baby clothing (even the ones that magically show up while the clothes are in storage!), blood, poop (even that sticky yellow baby poop!) and popsicle. I’m sure that it would work on other stains too but it won’t work on crayon that you’ve washed and dried onto your clothes :( especially if they happen to be your husband’s nicest white church shirts and white baptismal and temple clothing. Yes, that happened to me too. Sigh.

Here is how I use it:
1. Wash the stain out with water (I usually use cold since I’ve been told that heat can set the stain) and get out the chunks (i.e. if you’re dealing with baby poop wash out the clumpy looking seed things before they get on another part of the outfit!)
2. Scrub the Zote directly onto the stain. I am always very generous with this part because it’s cheap and it doesn’t seem to damage the clothing. I always work in the bathroom sink and just have the water on low so I can get it a little wet and scrub the stain using the other parts of the garment. I don’t ever use anything additional but I occasionally scrub with my nail if something is stuck on there!
3. Add more Zote if necessary and scrub some more and then let it soak for a bit. Now I like to let it soak because I think that usually the stains magically disappear when it is soaking. If I don’t soak them I don’t think it gets the really stained things clean (i.e. old formula stains). Sometimes I just leave it for 30 mins or an hour but like last night I passed out and forgot about the stains on the clothes and when I grabbed them this morning there wasn’t any yellow at all on them (there was definitely still some yellow on them last night!)
4. Throw the clothes into the wash! If you think that there might still be a little bit of stain left put some more Zote in and then throw it in the washing machine. Like with any stain check your garment before you dry it!
I wish that I had taken before and after pictures last night so that you could see and believe but I’ll have to add those later if when she poops through again or during baseball season! Until then you’ll just have to give it a try! :)

Good luck!

P.S. If you are one of my friends and have noticed that I still have stains on some many things you can chalk that up to not checking and scrubbing out every item of clothing from the hampers before throwing them into the washer.

P.P.S. Fels Naptha is also a great choice… check out this post on “super paste” and if you can’t find Fels Naptha at the store you can get it for $1.09 from Amazon (with free shipping if you have Prime!)