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If you’re a parent, chances are your life revolves around the following items; Coffee, crayons, and Ketchup. Each one of the items listed here can either bring joy or bring on immense frustration. Spilling coffee on yourself, not notice when a child that isn’t yours draws on your skirt, smearing dripped ketchup from your kids half eaten dinner-plate into your blouse; these common nightmares are unbearable. So rest easy, here are 7 common stains solutions.

Coffee: The easiest way to not get coffee stains on our clothing is to not drink coffee to begin with. Sadly, a world without coffee is a world not worth living in. So until the day clothing engineers develop a top that’s impermeable to liquid stains, we’ll have to take risks with our beverages and outfits. If you find yourself in that unfortunate situation, follow these quick steps to remove coffee stains from cotton and linen.

• Try to blot out as much coffee as possible.
• When you’re able to, pretreat the stain with laundry detergent (Pro Tip: Persil is giving out free samples currently!)
• Rinse well with water
• Blot with a little bit of rubbing alcohol.

Crayons: If you’re a parent, you’re more than familiar with Crayons. The wax-based artistic tools that are traditionally reserved for paper somehow make it’s way to every surface imaginable in your home. Luckily, the biggest manufacturers of our biggest nuisances have provided an easy process to removing these stains from our clothes.

“Scrape off as much crayon as possible.  Apply liquid dish soap and work into the stained area. Let stand a few minutes, rub fabric under warm water to remove the stain.  Machine wash using the heavy soil setting and the hottest water the fabric will allow..  Allow to air dry.  Repeat as needed.” – Crayola 

Peanut Butter: Surprisingly enough,“How to remove peanut butter from clothing” is a very popular search question. Understandably so, because it’s not the color in the peanut butter that you’ll need to worry about, it’s the greasy residue that sticks around that’ll make you mad.

• Remove as much peanut butter as you can from your clothing.
• Rather than using laundry detergent or stain remover, use dishwashing soap. It’s stronger against grease based liquids compared to your typical laundry soap.
• Once you’ve treated the stain with the dish soap, throw it in the washing machine on the highest temperature setting. Before you dry, check the stain.

Jelly: While we’re on the subject of removing stains, what’s a Peanut solution without a Jelly?

• Use a butter knife to remove any excess jelly.
• Apply a coating of liquid detergent on the stain.
• Let it rest for 15 minutes.
• After resting, soak in hot water with a scoop of oxygen bleach (IF IT’S A COLORED PIECE OF CLOTHING, use color-safe bleach)
• Rinse with new water and inspect the stain.

Ketchup: Ketchup stains are some of the most common and most dreaded. If you’re not careful enough with your initial stain cleaning, you will permanently damage your clothing. It’s awful being betrayed by innocent Ketchup, but if you follow these instructions very closely.

• Remove as much Ketchup as possible without rubbing the food into your clothes. Try using a light scooping motion.
• Run under cold water from the back side of the stain.
• Rub liquid detergent into the stain and soak the item for at least 10 minutes.
• Wash and AIR DRY. Heat will lock in the stain if it hasn’t been fully removed.

Mustard: Mustard is loved by many. We’ll take it on a Pork Roll, a pretzel, but you don’t want it on your dress.

• Blot the stain
• Rinse with cold water.
• Take a generous amount of detergent to the stain and scrub.
• Throw the clothing into the washing machine.
• Before drying, inspect the clothing and repeat if necessary.

Hot Sauce (Sriracha): 2016 proved to be the year of the Hot Sauce. According to Business Insider, the most favorite condiment in the United States is Sriracha. The Hot Sauce goes great with Rice and Beans, Tacos, Ramen Noodles, but not with a J. Crew Sweater. So when your Habor Cotton V-Neck runs into trouble, take note.

• Lightly coat the stain in laundry detergent and let it sit.
• Rinse the stain and detergent mix.
• Use a cloth and White Vinegar to sponge the stain out and rinse well.
• Repeat as much as you need until the stain is removed.

When you’re properly prepared, life becomes easier. So don’t fret anytime you spill any one of those items onto your clothing. If you’re now confident eating hot dogs again in your finest outfit, share this article with your friends! How do you remove stains? Let us know on our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest!