If you are reading this blog it is because your cloth stash is starting to look not so pretty and you want to know what on earth you can do about it to get them looking as clean as they smell!
There are a few things we need to discuss not to do as well as what to do.
Some things that work great to get diapers clean actually wills set stains!
Heat, vinegar and salt all set stains!
A proper wash routine that avoids setting the stains will do wonders, as prevention is easier than removal. So we are going to cover how to prevent stain setting and then address how to treat set stains.
Rinsing often is helpful! Knocking soil matter free from diaper and even immediately rinsing soiled diapers will prevent soiled matter sitting there and stains from having a chance to set in. I highly recommend trying to rinse free the worst of the maters immediately to lesson issues, but this is not always practical. If doable you can even rinse and apply a spot of dish soap to the soiled diaper, lightly scrub so soap penetrates all of soiled fibers and this will greatly prevent stains setting in, but this is also pretty high contact and not everyone is up for this close and personal of diaper care. If you are up for it, once the drop of detergent is scrubbed into wet diaper diaper can be tossed into laundry pail to wash latter.
Come laundry day I always recommend a cold waster full wash cycle with a soak period if possible. DO NOT add any detergent at all to this cycle. This serves a few purposes. First it allows urine to release from fabrics before detergent is added so that their is less urine present to possibly bind with detergent possibly causing ammonia build up issues. Second cold water is amazing fro lifting and removing stains. The agitation of this wash cycle will left and break free any soiled matter ad a soak period will allow time for stains to free themselves. I do recommend a full wash cycle on cold to prevent as much staining as possible. Now once this cycle is finished find a previously soiled item and look at it before moving on in washing routine. Dose it look clean? Or is their still stained tint to it? If it looks clean move on, if it still has a colored tint proceed to next step here.
Normally after the above steps if things looked clean I would suggest washing a full long cycle on hot with detergent. But if things look tinted try washing a full wash cycle on cold with detergent instead. If using liquid this should not be an issue. If using powdered detergent try dissolving it in some hot water before adding to wash. Now once this cycle is finished I want you to look at your previously soiled items again. Are they ice and white? How do they smell? Do they smell fresh or still have odor to them? Either way I recommend further rinses per basic washing practice covered in washing basics. At this point if there is still tinting chances are stains are set and will need treated latter, but odors mean fabrics are not clean and need further washing for sure. I find at this point often the covers will be color free but the inserts, flats and prefolds may still have tinting. This is fine as they are easier to treat and lift stains from latter on.
At this point I highly recommend a full cycle wash in hot water. Hot water remember will set stains, so we did not previously use heat, thus allowing stains to lift. But cold water alone if often not enough to fully sanitize and lift all odor. Fecal odor in particular means diapers are NOT clean and need further washing.
Please finish your ashing process as per usual for covers, we will next address stain lifting in the next section.
Once items are washed as usual you will remove your covers. If you find covers still have staining even after the cold prewashing, or if you had previously set stains you will first want to try simple sunning. I recommend sunning no longer than 20 minutes for covers as prolonged exposure to uv rays can shorten fabric lives and break down fibers. But for set stains 20 minutes may not be near enough. We do have other articles covering sunning and raining. Which is sunning in the rain.
If stains are super set and you really can't bare to see them you may try at your own risk a peroxide treatment. I never recommend getting peroxide directly on pul or lamination. But you may very very lightly mist pocket inner fabric or swab with a light peroxide solution. Just enough to moisten the fibers and not touch the pul. Allow to sit 10 - 20 minutes then rinse well. This is not harmful to child and is not harmful to fibers, but... I have not tested it on pul so can not guarantee it is laminate safe. The other option is to make a dish soap and peroxide solution to swab or mist with and it adds an extra punch. This is a very very good stain fighting combo.
For inserts, prefolds, fitteds and flats you need not be so delicate. I recommend after assuring no covers or pul items are present doing a soak with a 1/4 - 1/2 cup of peroxide. Peroxide is a natural sanitizing agent as we cover in our washing agents doc, as well as a natural bleaching agent. Allow items to soak for at least 20 minutes in this peroxide wash. It should greatly brighten your items, lesson or remove stains, and remove odors. I also recommend for really bad spots doing a pre treat before this soak. Take particularly stained items in this category and apply via mist bottle a good degree of dish soap peroxide and water solution at a ratio of a few drops or couple squirts soap, to 1/3 peroxide to 2/3 water ratio. saturate the stained area and allow to sit for 10 minutes then soak in the peroxide soak disclosed here above.
After spinning out do another good look over to see how things stand. Stains should be gone or significantly lessened at this point. I recommend doing another full wash cycle rinse to make sure no residues are left on your items, this can be done in cold water and if you like you can now add vinegar to this cycle, as though vinegar sets stains it should do no damage at this point.
Any further stains should be allowed to sun. Inserts, prefolds, flats and fitted can be sunned for prolonged time periods without significant damage. They are much hardier fibers that uv rays are less detrimental too.
Some people swear by bleaching to remove stains, and you may note I have not mentioned bleach at all, as I never ever recommend bleach for any use in any of our diaper blogs. Bleach eats and highly damages fibers, and it is too easy to ruin items. I never feel bleach is worth the risk. If you ever use bleach use it in a highly highly diluted solution.
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