How to Clean Milk From Upholstery

Removing milk stains from upholstery is simple but takes patience. It is important to not only remove the stain itself but also the entire milk residue within the upholstery. If milk is left sitting in the underneath layers of fabric, in time a rotten milk smell will radiate from the upholstery. Using everyday dishwashing soap and a vacuum can solve both of these problems.

Things You'll Need

• Paper towels
• Squirt bottle
• Dishwashing soap (without bleach)
• Vacuum with small attachment

Instructions

1. Blot up excess liquid with paper towels. Before cleaning it is important to make sure you have removed as much milk from your upholstery as possible. Make sure to pat down and blot the excess milk onto a paper towel. Do not rub the upholstery because that will only smear the stain and make it worse.

2. Apply dishwashing liquid to the affected surface. Make sure to use a soap that has no bleach. Take an amount of soap that resembles the size of a penny and softly spread the soap over the entire affected area with the tip of your finger and refrain from scrubbing. Dishwashing soap is very concentrated and will spread far. Start with a small amount of soap and if necessary work your way up to a larger amount of soap. Once you have spread soap over the entire surface of the spill, mist the area with a squirt bottle of water. Mist until the area with spilt milk is considerably wet. Let the soap sit and soak for approximately one hour; this way the soap has time to travel through the material, degrading all milk residue. Removing the stain is important but also removing the milk hidden in the underneath layers is essential to ensure no later smell of rotting milk.

3. Remove the milk stain. Lightly mist over the stain once more and using a paper towel blot down on the stain applying heavy pressure. This should remove most of the stain. If necessary, you may then scrub in very small circles. Make sure to scrub only within the limits of the stain.

4. Rinse the soap from your upholstery. Now that you have removed the stain, you need to remove the excess soap. To do this, mist a small amount of water over the stained area and blot up the excess moisture with a paper towel. Repeat this step until all of the soap is removed.

5. Vacuum the stain to remove all milk and soap particles. Most likely, the stain will already have been removed except in harsh cases. Either way this step is still important to ensure all of the milk particles throughout the upholstery have been removed and it will help further the removal of the stain. Mist water over the stain once more. Use a small vacuum attachment to then vacuum over the stain. Do this by setting the end of the attachment on the surface of the stain and without moving, letting the vacuum suction to the upholstery for approximately 15 seconds. Continue doing this around the area of the stain until the upholstery is dry. Repeat this entire process until the stain is effectively removed.