magic vinegar

over the past {almost} three years of being a wifey, i've been trying to learn all of those tips and tricks that all good moms and grandmothers know. you know like stain removal, how to treat burns, how to sew on a button, etc. i have a long way to come, but i did want to tell you about one of the new uses that i discovered for vinegar. 

i was washing colors one day and had these red pants in the mix with my favorite stripe shirt. you know where this is going - as i took out the clothes to put them in the dryer, my favorite stripe shirt's stripes had turned from white to pink! ahh rookie mistake. i had washed the red pants before, but alas, some of the dye had creeped over onto the only speck of white in the bunch - my stripe. 

it was late and i was planning on wearing my favorite stripe shirt the next day. so naturally i teared up and got really upset. sweet husband tried to calm me by saying things like "you can just buy another one" and "at least it wasn't expensive".  i had purchased the shirt at h&m months ago and new it was long gone, so i searched shop style, but found nothing but overpriced cotton shirts - nothing as good of a deal as my h&m find.

after trying to convince myself that it could now just be a pink and navy stripe shirt, i realized that i had to at least try to fix this.  after much googling, i discovered magic vinegar.  i've always known that vinegar was great and that it had many uses. however, i did not know it could pull out die from clothes {and make them really soft, too!} so, after i had washed the shirt twice and hopelessly sprayed stain remover on it, i grabbed my bottle of vinegar and got to work ::

1. fill pot with water 

2. add 1 cup of distilled white vinegar

3. bring to a boil

4. add the garment

5. turn down the heat a little

6. let garment sit for about 10 minutes

7. pull out garment to see if any of the pink dye has transferred to the water

8. dump out pink water 

9. repeat until all dye is removed!

bravo magic vinegar, bravo.

i apologize for no before pictures of the pink stripe shirt. i was too distraught at the time to think about blogging this :)