Today was a day of new discoveries for my Petite Picasso. She found that the purple crayon makes pretty squiggly marks on the beige wall. She learned that the marker continues to make lines even off of the paper. She realized that the clicky-top pen writes very well on her highchair tray.
I 
learned that moms should not live without a case of Mr. Clean Magic Erasers and a list of How to Remove Anything From Everything.
One of the great things about raising kids now is the abundance of “washable” products available. From Crayons to finger paints, there are parent-sanity-savers to avoid all of the catastrophes we caused as kids.
Color Wonder products are just missing the letters “ful” at the end, because they are. Nonetheless, little artistes will be the ones to test the limits of anything markable.
Crayon-stains are often removable with either being frozen and scraped with a butter knife, or saturating the item with a lubricating spray (depending on the surface!) The Magic Eraser does miraculous work to take it right off of the wall.
Laundry Stains need to be treated differently based on what the stain is a result of. The sooner the stain is treated, the more likely they are to not be permanent. Regular laundry detergent goes a long way. There are several items that are good to have in a laundry room for any situation, including acetone (finger nail polish remover), ammonia, chlorine bleach, color bleach (also known as oxygen bleach), pre-treatment sprays, rubbing alcohol, a soft brush, spot remover, and white vinegar.
Grass stains should be treated with a pre-treatment (enzyme) spray and then washed according to the fabric’s directions. Protein stains (human/animal sources) should be soaked in tepid water and washed with the appropriate bleach for the material…they should NOT be soaked in hot water because it could “cook” the stain into the fabric. More on fabric stains can be found at Household Management 101.
For getting out greasy stains, such as those caused by diaper ointment or Chapstick, a product found at auto-stores called Goop gets a lot of high marks from other moms. (I have not tried this one myself, but if you have, did it work?
Food stains are fairly easy to remove. From chocolate to drinks, StainExpert has a great list of what to do.
Pen marks, unfortunately, are one thing that may never come out. It took a tremendous amount of elbow-grease to get it off of her highchair tray. Most of the sources I checked said that ball-point pen ink will often be permanent.
The facts are that as parents, stains are in our future. As long as kids are going to be kids, and parents encourage their creativity, there will be splashes of all sorts of color on every surface. For now, I will do my best to keep the Crayon on the paper, the bucket of suds nearby, and my elbows greased for when her curiosity wins.
Image Source: flickr.com/photos/jameskidsart/1943435688/
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