Dryer Disaster

The day after camping is always a laundry marathon. I did seven loads on Thursday and on Friday morning I went to the dryer to unload the last batch to be folded. When I opened the door, this is what I found:

As is always the case with blog pictures, they looked much worse in person.  Green glittery crayon melted all over the clothes and the inside of the dryer.  There were a few clothes of Tess's (including her darling new birthday outfit from G&G!) but they were mostly Bree's clothes.  Pro:  she outgrows them so quickly anyway, plus they would be much cheaper to replace if need be.  Con:  Because her clothes are so tiny, there are a million of them in one batch of laundry, so the amount of clothes ruined was much bigger.

So of course I went straight to where we all go for wisdom:  the internet.  There were lots of suggestions about how to get the crayon out...this is what I ended up doing:  Rewash the clothes with detergent, Borax, and vinegar (I did this 3 more times.)  That got most of it out, but for the worst stained clothes I soaked them overnight in a tub of the same detergent, Borax, and vinegar mixture, only more concentrated because there was a smaller bit of water.  That worked quite well.  In the end there aren't too many green stains, and the ones that ARE there I can live with.

As for the dryer...I tried cleaning it with Lysol, then Comet, then Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, all to no avail.  Nothing was working.  So I ended up throwing an old white towel in there, turning it on, and hoping that it wouldn't continue to transfer the green crayon.  Luckily, it didn't.  I guess all of the crayon rubbed off on the original batch of clothes and the rest just stained the inside of the dryer.  So, my dryer is still streaky green, but I don't care as long as the clothes are not!

Moral of the story:  check pockets more carefully before washing clothes!