Whiten Yellowed Pillows Without Bleach

BEFORE:

Bo's pillow (which we've had for a while...even before he was born), was looking a bit yucky before but I didn't want to throw it out because it was just flat enough for him.

SUPPLIES:

• Yellowed pillow(s)
• 1 cup peroxide
• ½ cup white vinegar
• Approx. 2 tbs. laundry detergent
• Essential oils
• Tennis balls
• Old socks

STEP 1: Soak pillow(s)

First, I started my washing machine by putting it on the hottest setting. You really want to use hot water for this cleaning project, however, I don’t have a “hot” setting so I put it on warm.

*I would really recommend using hot water because even though the majority of the yellowing came out of this pillow, I think the *hot* water would have made it all come out.

While the wash was filling up, I placed my yellowed pillow in and poured in 1 cup of hydrogen peroxide, ½ cup white vinegar, and approximately 2 tablespoons of liquid detergent (I used Arm&Hammer).

Here, I'm adding the vinegar...

...and finally the peroxide.

I made sure to swoosh the water around to mix all of the ingredients when I was submerging the pillow.

I let the water fill up until it stopped, then pushed the pillow down to where it was submerged in the water. I then let the pillow soak for about 30 minutes as I do not have a soak cycle on my machine. If you have a soak cycle, you can follow the step above and just program your machine to the soak cycle.

STEP 2: Rinse pillow(s)

After I let the pillow soak, I closed the lid to let it go through the regular wash cycle. Once it got to the rinse cycle, I added 4-5 drops of essential oils and closed the lid again to let the machine continue with it’s rinse cycle. After the entire wash/rinse cycle was finished, I put my machine back on the rinse cycle again to ensure that all of the detergent had washed out of the pillow.

STEP 3: Dry pillow(s)

To dry the pillow, I first added some essential oils to a few of my socks that no longer had mates.

Then, I placed a tennis ball in each sock and threw them in the dryer with the pillow. These tennis balls (or wool dryer balls if you have them) should fluff up the pillow(s). I’ve read that you can also lay your pillow(s) out flat to dry in the sun on on top of your dryer. Since it’s ridiculously cold and rainy outside here in NY, I opted to throw mine in the dryer.

*Note: Even though I added essential oils in the wash cycle, I wanted to ensure that even after the pillow was washed, it smelled more like essential oils and less like vinegar once it was dry and put on the bed.

I was really impressed with how clean this pillow got just by adding a few extra ingredients to my wash cycle! I’m sure Bo will be happy to have it back and smelling nice.

If you are looking for more laundry tips then read this helpful guide on How to Whiten Laundry Without Bleach!