Friday, June 7, 2013

Have you ironed your table?


The photograph above is of my dining room table. It's an old table. I've had it probably since the girls were little. Anyway, I took this picture around eleven o'clock this morning.


However ... this was my dining room table around ten o'clock this morning. Pretty gross, huh? A few months ago a plant leaked all over it and left this ghastly white mess. Between this and all the other stains it had accumulated over the years, my poor table looked hideous. I was just starting to think I'd have to invest in some tablecloths to cover it up.

Then this morning I saw a friend (think it was Deb) post something about getting scratch marks off wooden furniture. It got me thinking of my table, so I did an online search to see if I could find something. I found one website by the makers of the "For Dummies" books, and it had some ideas. First, they said to put mayonnaise on the stains. I tried that, but it didn't work. Then they suggested toothpaste. That didn't work either. The next step was to mix toothpaste and baking soda together. Nope — it still wouldn't touch it. It smelled interesting, though.

So, I decided to look at another site and stumbled on this YouTube video. After smearing my table with mayonnaise, toothpaste, and baking soda, I pretty much figured, "What the hell!" and I decided to give the iron method a try. I could not believe my eyes — it worked!


It didn't take them all off, but it looks SO MUCH BETTER! I had never heard of this method before and would never have thought IRONING a table would make the stains disappear. I keep walking over to it to look just to make sure they haven't come back. I am truly amazed!

8 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. I KNOW!!!

      I swear, I keep walking up to look just to see if they've mysteriously come back. It's just the weirdest thing. Never heard of this before. :)

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  2. Did you iron directly on the wood or with a towel? Also, what temp? I have a coffee table I would love to get the white out of!

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    1. The lady in the video used a towel, but I used an old diaper that I still had around. I used to use them as burp clothes when I had babies. The video didn't give a temp, so I just sent my iron on medium. Let me know if it works for you too, Kaylyn! :)

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  3. Wooooa!!!! That is so awesome! thanks for sharing!!!

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    1. You're welcome. Good luck if you try it, too.

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  4. That is amazing! Who would think to do that?! Like how did someone decide to try ironing their table? Crazy. Glad it worked!

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    1. I know what you mean. Someone said that heat brings out moisture, so maybe that's it. However, my stains were quite old and they still came up. I didn't use the iron right after they appeared. It's been months, and even years for some of the others. Crazy, huh?

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