Mom hack for summer: mosquito protection without the sticky bug spray battle. Th

If you landed here looking for a miracle solution to summer bugs, let me give you the honest rundown of these mosquito repellent patches. The video shows me sticking these little citronella infused circles right onto my son's collar and shorts to avoid the usual screaming match that comes with aerosol spray. My final verdict is that they are decent for a casual evening on the patio. They will absolutely not protect your child if you go hiking near standing water or into the deep woods. They buy you maybe an hour of peace in a suburban backyard.

One thing I completely left out of the video is the laundry situation. If you forget to peel these patches off before tossing the clothes into the washing machine, the adhesive practically fuses with cotton. I ruined a perfectly good set of dinosaur pajamas last Tuesday because the sticky residue baked right into the fabric in the dryer. You have to treat them like name tags and aggressively remove them the second your kid walks inside.

This clip barely cracked five hundred views. I suspect parents are just tired of being sold natural remedies that only work half the time. My usual audience skipped right past it. Anyone who has dealt with real mosquito swarms knows you eventually just have to surrender to the heavy duty chemical sprays. The people who did comment were mostly asking if the patches smell bad. They do have a very strong citronella odor, but honestly I prefer that to the smell of traditional bug repellent.