Here’s a frequent scenario for me:
It’s a big day. I have important meetings with important people and I am wearing one of my best suits to mark the occasion. After breakfast, hugs and kisses with Papa and Baby Bee, I head to the office. When I get there a colleague taps me on the shoulder to point out that there is a smear of something — yogurt? cottage cheese? snot? play-dough? — usually on, but not limited to, my shoulders. Up The Hill Backwards has a fabulous poem about this very common working mother scenario called It’s Suit Day.
To be fair, I was a klutz before Baby Bee was born too. But now spots and stains are a daily presence in my life, screaming to my colleagues, boss and others that I am mother to a toddler. In some offices this raises a flag, especially in the early years when, for better or worse, many of us don’t want too much attention drawn to the mess of motherhood.
Here are eight tips and a host of other resources on managing spills and stains on your work clothes.
1. Don’t put your work clothes on until right before you leave the house. Breakfast with kids is a messy affair. If you can hold off on putting on your best clothes until after everyone is finished eating and clean-up has happened, you will be more likely to stay clean.
2. Wipe the nose before hugging. Big hugs are an important part of our day, but a quick nose wipe helps to make sure that I come away snot-free.
3. Resist the urge to use water. More times than I care to remember, I’ve used a wet paper towel to get something off, only to find that it has left a water stain worse than the original. Remove the stain in a dry way, or don’t do it all, especially if you are working with silk, or another delicate fabric.
4. Know the nearest dry cleaner (and shoemaker too!). If you have a good dry cleaner nearby, they may be able to give you same day service in a pinch. Or even help with an emergency stain right on the spot. It’s also happened to me several times that I’ve broken a heel; knowing where the nearest shoemaker is has been a lifesaver.
5. Keep an extra set of clothes at the office. I usually forget to do this, but if I did it would make my life a whole lot easier. If you don’t have room for an entire suit, consider a wrinkle-free business dress, like a jersey wrap dress or the like. With heels these often will look spiffy enough (and certainly better than the blouse with vomit on the shoulder).
6. Have a scarf or sweater on hand. Worst comes to worst, you can always cover up. This also helps if you sweat a lot and have armpit stains.
7. Keep stain removal product, baking powder and babywipes in your top drawer. Stain removal products might not help a short-term problem, but they will keep the stain from setting and getting worse. Baking powder can be used to remove greasy stains without water — just sprinkle some over the stain, let sit, and brush off until the spot is gone. Babywipes are useful for crusty spots that need a little, but not a lot of moisture.
8. Know that they probably won’t notice. Crazy as this sounds, especially if your meeting is with men, it’s very likely that the stain will be overlooked. You know it’s there, and will stress; they will not care one iota. If for some reason it comes up, make a joke about it and it will be forgotten quickly.
Here are some helpful stain removal links:
- Sarah Aguire’s housekeeping blog at About.com has an exhaustive A to Z list of stain removal tips. This one for vomit is particularly useful in the infant years.
- The How to Get Rid of Things blog has some good stain removal tips, especially this post on getting rid of sweat stains.
- The Fashionable Housewife recommends products to help with stain removal here.
- A couple of links from Ecostreet and Lime for eco-friendly stain solutions are here and here.
2 Comments
February 17, 2009 at 4:00 am
Great tips!
Same goes before you dress up to go out on a date!
My friends says that baby wipes remove almost any stain.
February 18, 2009 at 5:37 pm
loved this post!