sew_Tracy

I wish there was some way to get it out of leather!

Melrose R

I am sorry for your sister in law's loss but how nice that they thought of you to enjoy the fabric!

kay carlson

I agree that vinegar is your lucky ticket. Hopefully you can store the boxes outside until you are able to launder the items. For laces, and braids, etc. you might want to loop in hanks and tie in knee high nylon socks. I've put skeins of acrylic yarn in nylon knee highs to machine wash and dry. They come out beautifully clean and intact. Those nylons are cheap if you don't have a source of discarded pantyhose. :-)

Mitch's mom

The ammonia in the wash is the one sure fire remedy. Ammonia or Window cleaner with Ammonia are the only things that will remove nicotine stains from walls and washable surfaces. Lemon or plain ammonia is cheap and very effective. I'd rather wash the fabrics once and know the odor was gone.

hopetoquilt

For the unwashable items... I have crumpled up newspapers and put them around things and it soaks up the odor. My son vomited in my car (oh the joys of motherhood) and newspaper was the only thing that removed the odor. Crumple the papers so there is more surface area to absorb the odor.

ptquilts

55 gallon drum of Febreze......

grann of 6

Unfortunately, you are not just dealing with the smell, but the tars from the smoke as well. My mother was a smoker, and when I brought her stuff home, I had to wash it SEVERAL times. Some of the fabric had to be thrown out because I could never get the discoloration out. I use oxyclean which works wonderfully. Good luck, and keep the fabric outof the house till you get it cleaned, just like someone else said.

Knitette

Hopefully there's no more vomiting, lol, but if he ever does, dampen the area with water and cover liberally with ordinary salt, allow to dry, then hoover. Also works really well for milk spills, which smells rancid ​once it dries.

judys

If you know someone who has one of those ozone machines you can get odors out of leather. We had 8, yes 8, skunks move in under our closed in front porch room. We had to move out of the house from Thanksgiving until New Years and had to clean EVERYTHING. Even the frozen food in the refrigerator had to go. The hardest things to get the odor out of was leather....belts, shoes, etc. We put the ozone machine and all the leather in a really big cardboard box and ran it for a whole day or more. It worked! Had to live trap the skunks and have them disposed of. Took several weeks to get them all. The guys who put our steel siding on had inadvertently removed a screen in the foundation of the porch.

LadyElisabeth

Such wonderful ideas, in case I come across a good buy of "smelly" fabric, I might consider the purchase. Will wait to hear what works.