Eliminating dog stains from the carpet - an easy fix!!!

I consider myself to be extremely fortunate to be a mom to two adorable Shih Tzus who are a joy to live with every day. What I don't find a joy is that every now and then, one of them decides to leave a piddle spot on the carpet... gross! This was particularly common when we first moved into our new home four years ago... they were a bit stressed with the changes and decided to show us exactly how stressed by peeing on the white carpet. 

We have shampooed the spots using every type of cleaner we could think of... even the heavy duty pet stain remover from the local pet store didn't work. The stains would seem to disappear, only to reappear a short time later.

Then I came across a rumored remedy that seemed too good to be true, using very simple products already in our home:

Yep... good old baking soda and vinegar. And a vacuum cleaner.

This fix was incredibly easy.  Fill a spray bottle with straight vinegar and soak the stain... take my advice - DON'T be stingy with it!! It needs to be fully saturated to get into the carpet pad. And let's face it, vinegar is pretty inexpensive, so you can afford to use plenty.

After the stain is saturated, cover the spot with baking soda. It will immediately begin to fizz and you'll see some of the yellow foam up to the surface. (eww!)

Now comes the part where you have to be patient... The mixture needs to dry completely before removing it. Since our stain was at the very top of the stairs which are used daily, I threw a paper plate over the spot so we wouldn't kick baking soda everywhere.

After two or three days, remove the plate and scrape off majority of the baking soda. Make sure the carpet is dry, then run your vacuum cleaner over the top to get any leftovers.

I was amazed... the spot was completely gone! It's been a few weeks now and it has not resurfaced.It appears to be gone for good.

What I did discover is that the rest of my carpet now appears to be a bit dingy around that very clean spot... so I'll be shampooing the rest of it soon (SIGH). But the trouble spot is history. YAY!!

The Piddle Monsters!!