Sad Math

9.12.2011

1 new dress + 1 new gift = 1 big screw up

Allow me to explain.

Remember this dress?


This dress that I just finished.  This dress that I've worn exactly one time.

Well, it is now sporting some not-so-awesome red dye stains all over it.


I washed it yesterday with a bunch of other clothes, including a new sarong that my little sister gave me for my birthday, and unfortunately the sarong bled red dye all over the machine and all over my dress.  Ughh!

This, of course, sent me on a rapid googling mission to try to find out how to get the dye out of the dress.  I bought a couple of products off of Amazon and I'm hoping to give it a go this week, but if any of you have words of wisdom, please share them (as long as those words of wisdom are not "you should have known better than to wash new red fabric with your dress"...I can live without those words).

18 comments:

  1. Dang it! I feel your pain!!! :-(

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  2. no!!!!!! try that grandma's spot remover, you can get it at hobby lobby, joanns, hancock, etc. It's worked for me with fabric bleeding.

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  3. Mary Claire12.9.11

    I had burgundy fabric bleed onto off white sashing on a quilt. I stain sticked it like crazy (let it sit for a while) then washed it. I had to do that like three times, but it eventually came out.

    Sucks! I hope you can get it out!

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  4. Liquid dish soap (Dawn works best) and ammonia. Put the dish soap on the stain then pour ammonia over it, wrap it in a plastic bag and let it sit over night. Wash like normal. That has worked for all of my tough stains...unless you dried it before you saw that stains...then it won't work.

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  5. i have no words of wisdom, especially not any snarky ones! only this... "damn, that sucks!"

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  6. Anonymous12.9.11

    I eagerly await the results of your experiments -- a red sock did the same thing my black & white quilt. -- Sarvi

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  7. Noooooo! After getting Dreft for baby spit up, I use it on regular stains too and it works pretty well (I just spray, wash, spray, wash, spray, wash until it fades out). If all else fails, I bet it would look pretty cool if you just dye the whole thing magenta or red with the black gingham showing through.

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  8. Oh NO! I am so sorry!!! If it were me, I would probably buy some red dye--then you'd have a red gingham dress :)

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  9. My Mother gets stains out using Lestoil. Just one caps-full should do the trick. Going forward, I recommend the Shout Color Catchers. It really does work. Hope it works!

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  10. Anonymous12.9.11

    oh heck no! :( I'm linking to this: http://www.amazingwhipit.com/about-whip-it.html I saw an infomercial on it tonight.. probably bogus, but I don't have any ideas that aren't listed.

    I hope it comes out!

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  11. oh no! I hope you can get it out!

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  12. I've always had great success with the oxi-clean products - try rubbing in the granules and let them set in a basin of water with your stains. That cute dress better pull through!

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  13. Oh I've never tried the Grandmas on dye, but let me know if you try it and it works because the Grandma's stuff is serioiusly AMAZING shit. I use is on grease stains (read: hot dog fingers on kid clothes) and it totally takes it out. Like it's magic times 12! I buy mine at ACE hardware. I actually cut the tip off so the stuff pours out instead of in drops. I use it liberally.

    http://www.grandmassoap.com/

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  14. Poop! Been there, done that with navy colour bleed on a lovely orange fine wool top I had worn only a couple of times. But yes if all else fails I too think the dress would look great as red gingham!

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  15. We all should know better, but hey we ALL make mistakes right? Well I hope so since I've totally done it too :( I wish I had suggestions but I never got the stupid dye out of my stuff, fingers crossed your solutions work!

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  16. Oh gads! That one time was super lovely. And it sounds like there are many an option to try to get it back. If not dye it a deep red or better yet a tye-dye something.

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  17. Oh, that would make me cry. I put Shout on everything, but I haven't had this particular issue--let us know what works!

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