Unusual Uses for Aspirins
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A couple of aspirin can do more than alleviate your headache — they also help cut flowers last longer, remove laundry stains, and even ease the sting of mosquito bites.
(Safety tip: If you have aspirin allergies do not use these methods.)
Flower Power
Freshly cut flowers are lovely; if only they’d stay fresh a little longer. Well, they can with a little help from the contents of your own medicine cabinet (we’re talking real aspirin, like Bayer — not ibuprofen, acetaminophen, or other common pain relievers). The next time you get a fresh bouquet, crush a few aspirin tablets using the back of a spoon and add the powder to a vase filled with water. The salicylic acid in the aspirin will help keep the water clean and free of flower-damaging bacteria.
Stain Removal
Aspirin can also take the headache out of doing the laundry — especially when dealing with stubborn protein stains like sweat, egg, and antiperspirants can be removed with an aspirin solution.
- For sweat and antiperspirant stains: Crush a couple of aspirin and mix them into a half a cup of warm water. Use the mixture to saturate the stain and then let it sit a couple of hours. Launder as usual and the stains will be gone! (For really tough stains you may have to either soak longer or re-treat the area).
- For an egg stains: Scrape off as much of the stain as you can and make a paste of crushed aspirin and water. Working from the back side of the fabric, spread the paste over the stained area and work it in with a soft toothbrush. Then rinse it with some warm water.
Pest Control
Warm summer months bring sun and fun — but also insects who want to bite and sting. But the itch of mosquito bites and bee stings can be soothed with — you guessed it — aspirin. Wet the pill and set it on the bite for instant relief.
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