I am totally addicted to steam-cleaning the carpet in the living room. I made the highly questionable decision to use off-white when we bought this apartment and in the past 4 years it has gotten progressively more and more yick. I got a carpet cleaner a few years ago for Christmas but it has rotted away in the closet for quite some time since, let’s face it, slightly cleaner off-white rug doesn’t really do much in the way of gratification for the work. Plus I didn’t like the non-toxic solution I found, but mostly it felt like a lot of work for little result despite seeing how gray the dirty water was.
And then a month or so ago? Lucy knocked over a cup of coffee right in front of the couch and it left a huge stain. And Pickle’s IBS causes her to have farts wherein sometimes poop and/or leaks out. And they both puke. And I can’t always get the rug scrubbed right away, which causes smells and bacteria and the like.
So I got a SpotBot. And I love it. Lucy, Chico and I watched it motor away on some of the stains in front of the couch. And today I got out the big Bissell and ran it not once but twice. And the carpet may not look that much better, but you cannot even imagine how gross the water was when I went to dump it. I mean, holy crap. I may not be the most immaculate person in the world, but I do clean up stuff that falls on the carpet and stuff. And then it hit me.
New York City is a dirty place, even out here in the Outer Boroughs. The charcoal gray isn’t because I don’t clean enough, it’s because there is four years of city grime ground into the carpet. Thus is born a new rule:
No more shoes in this house. I mean it. I had intended for this to be a rule right from the start but my complete mental freakout shortly after we moved in ended up taking precendence over the poor, poor carpets.
And I’m officially rescinding my no conventional cleaner rule to get this carpet cleaned up unless one of y’all has a hippy alternative that really works. My machine is one of the cheapo Bissell uprights (and the pet SpotBot.) I use Kids n Pets for spot cleaning–will that work in a machine?
I’ll tell ya, there’s this rule in NYC about having a certain amount of your space covered by rugs or carpet and this is one of those times I really regret being such a stickler for rules. My life would be SO MUCH EASIER if we could just go with the parquet floors.
I dream of owning an upright steamer. I have the little green machine but that’s just for spots and boy oh boy when I clean a spot does it ever become freaking obvious that the entire carpet is is desperate need of cleaning.
I’m curious, does NYC really have a carpet rule? That’s crazy, if they do. Why?
I don’t think it’s an official citywide rule but most buildings and coops here have it written into the rules that 80% of your space must be covered by carpet/rugs. It’s because of noise, which makes sense except I don’t know how many people actually follow it. I’d rather tiptoe and have no rugs personally
With two cats, a dog, and a toddler I shudder to think what our house would be like if we had carpet.
We do have two area rugs and when they get that “not so fresh feeling” I sprinkle them liberally with baking soda (Thomas loves to help!), rub in the baking soda with a brush, and then vacuum the rugs multiple times.
I keep trying to enforce a no shoes rule but it never seems to stick.
What’s under the carpet? If it’s wood I say seriously consider ripping up the carpet.
The no-shoes rule is important. We have that rule and it makes a HUGE difference in the state of our carpet. I vacuum A LOT, too. I wish I had a carpet cleaner…
If your cleaner doesn’t work, you may want to consider having it professionally done. We had our carpet professionally cleaned last month. They were pretty quick and the carpet was 3 shades lighter when they finished!
Gina–the problem is that we were required to put down the rug so it’s like this huge, custom-cut and bound rug that we have nowhere to store and it’s under really heavy cabinetry (I tried to convince C to send it out for cleaning and he looked at me like I was nuts to suggest moving them
) I’ll try the baking soda for general upkeep–Lucy will love that!
Cori–I’m definitely keeping that as an option.
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