Fresh as a daisy

Recently, our bath towels fell victim to mildew. It's an unfortunate fact of life at our casa. Our master bath is an interior room with no windows or natural light. After several unpleasantly stinky toweling off sessions, my husband begged me to toss the towels. I however had faith that they could be saved. To the internet I scurried. After some searching, I learned of these key de-mildewfying ingredients: sunlight, borax, vinegar and tea tree oil.

The towels have been successfully mildew stink free for 2 weeks now. Here's how we got there:

The towels hung on our porch railing for a Saturday afternoon sun bath.
After a few hours of fresh air, heat and light, they shimmied over to our laundry room for a hot water wash. This bath was prepped with 1 cup of borax and a light amount of laundry detergent. 1 cup vinegar and about 10 drops of tea tree oil were added to the fabric softener dispenser.

That's it. The mildew smell is undetectable now. Repeating these steps once a month should keep the towels smelling fresh.