By Angela from Clinton, MA
The hands down winner for me. I followed the advise of the editor was to start simple and work up from there. I used 1 box of baking soda and followed the regular washing instructions, voila, almost everything was gone from 4 dress shirts and 2 high-end restaurant aprons. (My son works at a high-end restaurant and picked up a brown crayon and put it in his apron. He forgot all about it and all his uniforms were 'ruined', at least till today.)
Of course, that's after I gave up following my first method (it was grueling and I couldn't get it to work). At first I started with one of the aprons and a blunt knife, trying to scrape off the excess crayon and running boiling water from the back of the fabric through the apron and blot onto a clean white towel to 'blot' off the crayon residue. This was grueling because the apron was water-resistant and I couldn't get the boiling water through it easily. Hardly anything was coming off and I scraped and boiled water for 2 hours, barely making a dent in the apron. My hands and back were sore.
I gave up and searched the internet and found all your great ideas. Starting simple was the miracle for me - although I was worried....the washing instructions called for a gentle cycle and cold water. I used almost 1 full box of baking soda, upped the temperature to 'warm wash and warm rinse', used my gentle detergent and set my HE washer on gentle.
After the first round, I had a couple spots of crayon left on an apron and a bunch on a shirt sleeve (it had been turned inside out on itself, so when I opened it there was still crayon all over inside it), so put the whole load thru another gentle cycle with warm wash/warm rinse and detergent. (I didn't have any more baking soda). After the 2nd time I only had 1 small spot on the apron that I could rub off with my fingernail. Too easy!
Thanks for the great tip!
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How do I get orange crayon out of my husband's khaki shorts?
By Shaquan S.
By T&T Grandma06/01/2011There is a cleaner that dry cleaners use, you can find it in hardware stores. It's a chemical that needs a lot of fresh air around, and is flammable.
| I did a wash with crayon in my pocket I rewashed in hot and it came out of everything but two white shirts. One is my husband's favorite golf shirt. Please help! There is just one or two tiny spots on each one but right where they are obvious.
PatW | |
| Answers: | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 01/15/2001 |
| I have a suggestion that sometimes works. Place a paper towel on your ironing board. Lay the part of the shirt with the crayon over the paper towel. Place another paper towel on top of the crayon spot, and a sheet of waxed paper on top of the paper towel. Iron using medium (no steam) setting. The waxed paper protects your iron, and the heat will liquefy the crayon and transfer it to the paper towel. This works most of the time - not always, though. | |
| By atallred | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 01/15/2001 |
| The iron tip (suggested by atallred) may remove the wax but it may not remove the color. After using a hot iron to remove any residual wax, take a cotton swab dipped in bleach and dab at any stain left. As soon as the stain is gone wash the white shirts. This tip is for white items only. When I was a young girl we use to melt crayons to draw on T-shirts. Then use an iron to remove the excess wax. This was an easy way to "paint" designs on T-shirts. This is why I doubt that the iron tip will work.
Mrs Kathy Cohen Northfield, VT | |
| By kcohenvt | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 01/15/2001 |
| This happened to me once and someone told me to spray WD40 on the spot, let it set then wash it out. It worked for me, I hope it works for you. Since then I use WD 40 a lot, it takes crayon off walls great as well. | |
| By nona | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 01/16/2001 |
| The same thing happened to me with my children's summer clothes. I washed them a few extra times with stain remover, but it didn't work. Then I used WD-40. It worked very well. The stains weren't totally gone the first time, but did come out after a few more washings, which was a good thing because the WD-40 smells! Don't worry, there's hope for your clothes!! | |
| By emmalemma | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 01/16/2001 |
| Crayon and Lipstick are both oil based and I have had the best luck using Ronson's Lighter Fluid. You have to break down the oil with a solvent and then use soap or detergent to break down the solvent. Works for me. | |
| By aldrevlo | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 09/16/2002 |
| Crayola has a GREAT site on how to remove almost any of their products from almost any item. IE clothing, fabric, wood, brick etc.! GOOD LUCK:-> | |
| By jsillhart | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 12/05/2004 |
| Hi Jack,
Go to Crayola's site. Choose the type of crayon you have melted on your clothing, then go to step 2 and choose laundered items.
http://www.crayola.com/canwehelp/staintips/action_tip.cfm They have a lot of good tips for getting rid of it.
| |
| By Thrifty_Fun | |
| Tide's new cold water formula | 03/30/2005 |
| If a crayon ever makes it through to the dryer, just wash your clothes again in Tide's new cold water formula. It worked for me--crayon was yellow & from Applebee's. The spots are gone, can't tell where they were. | |
| By Tonya Vest | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 04/30/2005 |
| I usually don't get to sing praises - but this one deserves it! I ruined a whole load of laundry when my 5 year old left a purple crayon in his jacket pocket. I had checked all the pants as I usually do, but the jacket escaped my attention. Well, the jacket, and my favorite pair of jeans were history, along with the minor stains on 5 other pairs of jeans and other items. I tried the solution shown here - and to my amazement, IT WORKED! I used Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser - on the clothes, sure - it was tedious, I had to treat every stain, then soaked all the clothes in HOT water for an hour, then washed in OXY CLEAN and Tide. I was very pleased with the results! Bravo to the person who originally suggested it! Thanks to all! | |
| By JOANN (Guest Post) | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 07/26/2005 |
| This just happened to me yesterday. I tried a product my mom suggested. It's called Lickity Split, made by Kirby (the vacuum people). I was amazed at how well it worked. It was a red crayon and you can't even see any spots. I pretreated all of the spots and let it set for about 30 min. Then washed the clothes in hot water on the heavy duty wash cycle. It has a strong citrus smell, but once the clothes were washed you couldn't smell it. | |
| By Michele (Guest Post) | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 11/20/2005 |
| Thank you to Tonya! Your solution worked wonders on a big load of my boys' clothes that had RED crayon all over it. Washing the load over again in Tide's new coldwater formula got almost all of the crayon out and was much easier and less time-consuming than any of the other solutions I saw, especially the one on Crayola's site. It would've taken hours and who has that kind of time with 3 little ones??? | |
| By mjhumphrey97 (Guest Post) | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 02/04/2006 |
| Tide Coldwater works like a charm. I put an entire load of "green clothes" in the wash on the heavy duty cycle with warm water. ALL of the crayon came out! | |
| By Mandy (Guest Post) | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 02/07/2006 |
| My Daughter left a Black Crayon in her pant's, and I thought that my cloths and dryer were ruined. Then I used a Little WD-40 , Oranger TKO and Tide Cold water detergent and I was suprised that it worked. I had to wash the cloths in HOT water 3 times but all the stains came out. | |
| By Debbie (Guest Post) | |
| RE: Crayon off Clothing? | 03/17/2006 |
| Thank you for your suggestions. I tried the 20 Mule Team Borax, soaking my crayon filled clothes in hot water with laundry detergent and the borax for 45 min. then let the washing machine do the work. I had to do it 2 times but the clothes look perfect and the 20 Mule team borax worked great! | |
| By colleen (Guest Post) | |
My son had a blue crayon in his pocket. I washed it and dried it. Now I have blue clothes and a the inside of the drier is blue? How do I get it out?
P.L. from Muscotah, KS
By Julie.
By Patty from NC
By Tara
By Kim in Carolina
By Molly of Florida
By Gayle
I recently washed and dried a load of clothes which includes: light jeans, a white tank top, a dark American eagle hoodie, some cotton dark t-shirts, and some underwear with a dark blue crayon. I tried the tide cold water, and spray and wash 3 times, which helped get the waxy part out, but the stain is still there. I also tried goo gone but it didn't help. Does anyone know how to get the stain part out without eating through my clothes? I heard borax can eat through them and dreyel is for colorfast clothes, have no clue what that means. How do you know if it is colorfast? This is my first time with a crayon stain. I only have 3 other pairs of jeans and these were my expensive pair! Thank you so much for the help.
Crystal from Eugene, OR
What worked for me was to place the shirt between two rags and press it with a hot iron to remove the excess wax, and then spray WD 40 followed by scrubbing orange bases hand cleaner to lift the stain. Luckily the crayon is gone. (01/20/2007)
By Danielle
By Stacey N
By NIKKI
By Arica
By Laura
By Lou
By Cindy
By Lauren of Indiana
By Katie in NH
By Jamie
By Jill from Iowa.
Crayon Stains on Clothing. How do I remove crayon from clothing?
My boyfriend works at UPS and he uses a black crayon to mark boxes. He called me at work to ask me how to remove melted, dried crayon from his work clothes and the dryer. Needless to say I was not a happy camper, lol. He used a magic eraser on the dryer and it worked completely.
Then he sprayed his clothes with Simple Green cleaner, let them soak for 20-30 minutes. He washed them in hot water with Oxiclean, a regular cup of laundry soap, and a regular cup of Dawn (regular being the cup you use with the laundry soap). He let washer agitate for a little bit then let them soak for 30 minutes then rinsed and they were clean.
All I can say is thank God I was at work, LOL.
Also, no WD40 smell. The Simple Green is organic so it won't hurt septic systems which I have. Thanks so much for this site. It saved us about $300.00 in clothes for work.
By jwalkjes from Gulfport, MS
I saturated each red stain (had to be a RED crayon, didn't it) and threw it into the washer. After a little bit of sitting, I set up a soak cycle with my regular detergent, some baking soda (which I often add to keep my laundry fresh) and vinegar (ditto). I let them soak for 30 minutes or so and then washed them in warm (I often use cold washes).
To my delight, all the red was GONE! I had a mix of towels, kids clothes, my husband's work shirts, underwear and my favorite skirt. All look as clean or cleaner than normal (my husband's white shirt practically glows). So I guess my advice here is to start simple and work up to the drastic measures. I'm not sure if different crayons stain worse, I'm pretty sure these were the classic Crayola brand.
About cleaning up the dryer, I was able to wipe most of it off with a wet towel, while the dryer was still warm. It looks like the crayon moved to the lint trap pretty quickly, minimizing the mess. I'm keeping an eye on it and will probably do another wipe down after I finish drying the clothes from this last load.
I had a conversation with my oldest son about NEVER putting crayons in his pocket again. I think I should get in the habit of checking pockets better though. (06/18/2009)
By jess
1 cup color safe bleach (great value brand for HE washer)
1 cup Borax
1 cup Shout Triple Acting
1 cup hydrogen peroxide
1 cup distilled white vinegar (on-hand)
4 scoops (about 3/4 cups) SUN oxygen all-purpose cleaner
Result? Almost perfect! There's only about 4 shirts with little spots left, but I'm very impressed with the results, considering how bad the clothes were. I ran another express cycle and there were 2 spots left in two of the clothes which are not that visible... still impressive.
Note:If you don't have the washer's soak option, overnight soaking will do the work like some people did. (7/31/09) (07/28/2009)
By Eva1
By Alacin
My 4 year old hid some crayons in her only good winter coat and never took them out. It was washed and dried before we knew it and it is horrible. Please help me figure this out.
How do you get crayon stains off clothes?
My son put a red crayon into his pants pocket, which I then put in the laundry. I did not realize this until after drying the entire load. How do I get red crayon out of the clothing?
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Black Oil Pastel Crayon on Clothing