Don’t worry if your two-year-old got ahold of a ballpoint pen and your favourite shirt, or even your couch, were the victims of an art-attack. It happens at least once to every parent and while it looks like a big, dramatic problem, it’s pretty easy to deal with. Try these tips to remove ink stains from clothing!
This is one of those fun, quirky little cleaning hacks that actually works really well! We all fall victim to an unwanted ink stain at some point so it’s good to know that it’s simple enough to deal with using something that a lot of us have on hand in the house at all times! Here are some of the best ways to remove ink stains from clothing.
The Trick to Remove Ink Stains From Clothing
I just had to try this first trick out when I heard about it. Of course, I’ve had my own time-tested method for removing ink stains, but this one works just as well and it’s kind of fun too!
Start out with an ink stain on some kind of fabric. I just drew on this pair of white shorts as an example, kind of trying to mimic what an art attack from a two-year-old might look like. Have you seen that picture floating around Facebook where the girl was wearing khaki coloured pants and she went to scratch her leg with her pen only to realize that her pen was clicked open? I laughed cause this totally reminded me of that when I stood back and took a look at it. 🙂
Anyway.
Next, spray the stain generously with hairspray. Even cheapo hairspray works really well for this!
You can see the ink starts to release immediately.
Word to the wise: Consider placing a towel or something like that under the stain that you’re working on. I had my shorts folded in half and this works so well that the ink ran through all 4 layers of fabric as soon as I sprayed! It came out fine, it was just unnecessary to spread the stain, I think. 🙂
The final step is to throw your clothing item in the wash, wash it, and stand back in amazement!
If the fabric you’re removing the ink from can’t be thrown in the washing machine, just use a warm, damp cloth to gently remove the ink from the fabric. The hairspray will have already dissolved the ink completely, so you really just need the damp cloth to pick it up off of the fabric at this point.
Other Ways to Remove Ink From Clothing
Of course, it’s the alcohol in the hairspray that makes the hairspray trick work so well, so if you don’t have any hairspray in the house, you can totally just use straight rubbing alcohol.
And if you don’t have rubbing alcohol either? Some types of hand sanitizer should do the trick as well!
Give it a try the next time you get an ink stain on your clothing and let me know how it goes!
Don’t forget to pin this idea to remind yourself of it when you need it!
OTHER HELPFUL TIPS LIKE THIS!
- How to Properly Clean Upholstery
- The Very Best Homemade Ant Killer
- How to Clean 5 Gallon Water Bottles
- How to Clean Really Tarnished Silver Naturally
- Cleaning Orange Water Stains Naturally
- How to Clean Spray Paint Off of Skin
- The Creek Line House Cleaning Tips and Tricks Archives
Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.