All Natural Carpet Stain Remover

I don't know about all of you guys, but in my house with two dogs, a husband, and a preschooler stains on my rugs are commonplace.  It is almost a full time job to keep them looking half-way decent; I'm not going to lie, I usually turn a blind eye until they get so ridiculous I can't stand it anymore.  I'm trying to eliminate as many harsh cleaning chemicals as I can and the rugs were a major concern of mine.  My little one is always on the floor rolling around and playing, so the stains and germs she comes into contact with are a big concern for me.  I searched high and low looking for a simple and natural method to remove the stains in my rugs AND disinfect them. After a long time, I finally found a recipe I liked! You can find the original here, while I kept the recipe original I changed the procedure a little bit. I think my way really insures the stains are completely removed from deep in the carpet and won't come back, AND I think it really disinfects the carpet. So, here we go!

Materials

See, my rug was quite sad.

1) Organic White Vinegar-This is the disinfectant 
2) Pure Baking Soda
3) Scrub Brush
4) Vacuum. I like the Shark Professional Navigator Lift-Away Upright Vacuum from bedbathandbeyond.com (AMAZEBALLS)

Step 1: Pour Vinegar on the stain. I poured a lot on since my stains were set in, but you can do as much as you feel is necessary, I don't think you need to drown the stain if it's relatively fresh.

Step 2: Put baking soda over the vinegar and let them sit and fizz for about a minute.

My daughter loved watching the fizzing, we had a nice little science experiment and lesson while I cleaned!

Step 3: This is where my procedure varies from the difference.  Once the bubbles stop fizzing I took the scrub brush and really worked the mixture into the stain. I made sure scrub in all directions to really get the mixture into the fibers for maximum stain removal and disinfectant.

Step 4: After you have completely worked the solution into the stain (there shouldn't be any baking soda on the surface of the rug), take a damp rag and blot the mixture from the rug. You are trying to get all the extra solution that the fibers didn't absorb. I rubbed the damp rag into the rug a little to get any extra vinegar that was way down deep.

Step 5: Once the area has dried just vacuum up any extra baking soda. Even if you don't see any, make sure to vacuum because since we rubbed in the solution there could be some left over baking soda deep in the rug fibers.

Here is the result of my little concoction, with before an dafter shots. This stain, though small, has been on my carpet for over a month! It took me maybe 5 minutes to do the entire process per stain. After I finished with this, I moved on to the food stains left by my daughter (this is our kitchen rug), this simple solution took them right out, and they had been there for at least three months!  Finally I moved to the area where my husband sits, he's a mechanic, so along with food stains there are some grease stains from his shoes...GONE!!!!

After I cleaned the rug I decided to move to our microfiber couch that is in our den.  The den is basically our daughter's play/TV area. When she has her snack in the afternoon, and before she goes to bed, she will watch TV there. This has resulted in some pretty gross stains on that couch. I figured it couldn't get any worse so I tried this procedure and the results were amazing!

The after is a little darker because the couch was still a little damp when I vacuumed, but you can still see the difference! But once the couch dried it looks even better! I was so excited, I'm planning on deep cleaning my couch this weekend...and the best part is not that the stain is gone but that it has also naturally been disinfected, which is wonderful when there are little people running around!

If you would like to see how I naturally remove stains from clothes click here.

If you would like to see my cleaning schedule which helps maximize my efficiency when cleaning, click here.