Pin 31–acne pads clean up paint

Inevitably while painting some paint ends up on the floor, for me at least.  I’ve gotten pretty good at avoiding much, but there’s always the almost fall off the stepladder or losing your balance in some awkward position to get that tight corner and then there are blots of paint.  Or, my favorite, you don’t realize the blot then step in in and you’ve got textures paint marks around the room.  With latex paint clean up is generally not too bad but there is always the 1 or 2 marks that just won’t come up.  THIS PIN says you can use acne pads or facial cleaning wipes to get them off.  Supposedly the alcohol helps lift the paint.

So here’s one of my paint marks…  annoying.  I could’ve probably scratched it off after a bit of work but who wants that w-word.  Here goes…

and… woohoo!  minimal effort, paint gone! excellent.

Now I’m sorry to say it didn’t work out so well for this little bugger…

Bottom line – worth trying

It didn’t take very long to realize that the more smudgy-smeary type paint marks came up a bazillion times easier than the blot types.  It could be that the paint was too thick I suppose but it still came up using my finger nail.  The source site says it’s best used within a day of drying which I did not make (it was nearly 4 days after).  It’s a great shortcut for the thinner marks for sure.  I’m sure the sooner you get to it the better it works.  As a warning though, after going through the room and cleaning up all my marks (more than usual I have to say – it’s like I was painting drunk!) my fingers were really dry and smelled like the pads.  After several washings and lotion applications they were better but still felt tight.  More than 24 hours later I still feel like I lost my fingerprints.  I’m sure it will go back to normal but if you’ve got a lot of marks maybe grab some latex gloves!

Stephanie

PS – As of posting this it’s been a week since I did this and my finger tips went through a whole scaly, flakey and peeling thing.  I’m sure it was the salicylic acid in the pads.  So either wear gloves or use something without acne medication if you’ll be cleaning up a bunch of spots like me!