Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Easy, Non-Toxic and Pet Friendly Carpet Freshener

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In my perfect world, neither my dogs or I would be exposed to, or live in a toxic environment. But it’s not a perfect world and unfortunately we are exposed to hundreds of toxins/chemicals every day of our lives.

When we bought our house almost eleven years ago, we didn’t really give any thought to the wall to wall carpeting in the living room, master bedroom and den. I had been tired of chasing dog hair bunnies on the hardwood floors of our previous home, so I welcomed the idea of carpet, not really considering what a pain in the ass it could be.

I don’t want to burst your bubble or anything, but here’s a hard truth.

Dogs ruin carpets.

Do I LOOK like I’m ruining the carpet? NO, No I LOOK like I’m taking a nap.

If you have carpet and dogs, here are some guarantees.

  • When your dog has to vomit, they won’t go into the bathroom to puke on the tile, so it’s easy to clean up. Oh no. They will ALWAYS make for the carpet, and I’m not talking about the throw rugs, I mean the wall to wall carpet, or the area rug that’s just too damn big to wash.
  • At some point in your dog’s (and your carpet’s) life, there will be ass juice. Yeah, you know what I’m saying. Fido did not just do the latest dog dance on your carpet, no. No, Fido did the Boot Scootin’ Boogie and in the process released those anal glands and all that nasty stuff that went with it. If Fido was good at what he did, he may have left a little bit of poop with it.
  • A dirty or wet dog will head right for the rug. Because really, when they’re dirty and wet, they only want to roll around, and only a carpet will do.
  • No matter how well you train your dog to eat their treat on their bed or mat, odds are at some point, that Kong and all the stuffing that was in it, are going to be bounced around. On your carpet.
  • On that same line of thought, a dog that loves to steal food, will run with their stolen goodies and eat them on your carpet. My carpet has seen chicken necks, Bisquick, and so many other things, I’ve actually lost count.

Chicken necks. On the carpet. What a lovely surprise.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, “If carpets could talk, the stories they’d tell.”

I would love to get rid of that carpet, and get down to the hard wood below, but having Senior dogs with mobility issues means it’s not in the cards at the moment.

And yes, I could put Stanley Steamer on speed dial, but my pocket book doesn’t allow, and I cannot realistically shampoo my carpet every week.

With the snows of winter and the rains of spring, come wet dogs.

I’m not sure about your dogs, but even if we’ve toweled them off, they still run straight to, and roll around on my rugs. Now I don’t typically mind the smell of a wet dog, but when I walk in the door and say, “My house smells like wet dog,” I gotta take action.

My dogs also like to ‘swim’ on the carpet, and they naturally do this on the seam, so not only do I have a stained, stinky carpet, I also have a carpet that is fraying in certain areas.

I told you dogs ruin carpet.

I’ve given up on the stained carpet. I talked to my carpet guy and he said, “Jodi, if you replace it now, the dogs will just ruin it again.”

He’s got a point. So I do the best I can to prevent and treat stains when they happen, but what do you do about that smell?

Carpet fresh is nice, but I worry about the chemicals and toxins in it. Luckily for us, making our own carpet fresh is pretty simple.  All you need is baking soda, essential oil, and a shaker can.  I use an old parsley container, but you can pick up a really pretty glass one at your local department or dollar store. (If you do this, use some plastic wrap or aluminum foil between the container and the lid, to help keep the baking soda from losing it’s smell.)

I like to make this in bulk, so I go to my warehouse club and buy a large box of baking soda. I also buy my coffee in bulk, so I save a the container, and I’m able to make a large batch. (NOTE: Make sure to wash that coffee canister out good, or guess what? Yup, you’ll have coffee smelling carpet freshener)

It’s important to choose an essential oil that is 1) Non toxic to dogs and 2) Has a smell you can tolerate.

I say, non-toxic because if you choose a smell that say, your dog finds interesting, you could have a dog licking the baking soda up from the rug, and then you have a totally different mess.

The other important thing to note, is to make this in advance and let it sit at least over night, so the baking soda really absorbs the smell of the oil. If you are in a pinch, you can let it sit four hours, but I wouldn’t do any less, and I really think 24 hours is the best.

I use Lavender essential oil, because I like the smell, and it also has some calming benefits.

I usually make the freshener in layers. A bit of baking soda then a drop or two of oil. Once it’s all in the container, I’ll give it a small upside down shake, careful to keep my hand on the top and bottom of the container so there are no mishaps.

Then, after your dogs have eaten and been walked, (really, you don’t want those assholes walking through this stuff) sprinkle it all over the carpet. I like to let this sit on the carpet for a half an hour to an hour, so while your waiting, pour yourself a glass of wine and sit down with a good book.

You deserve it.

NOTE: Wine also has calming benefits, but they don’t make an essential oil that smells like wine, and if they did, it wouldn’t be safe for dogs!

This is part 2, in a series designed to help you make simple changes, that will help reduce toxin exposures for both you and your pets. If you missed part 1, you can read about it HERE.

When You WTF Yourself

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The dogs have become use to going potty on our walks, especially Sampson. Delilah will go out in the yard, but with Sampson’s bad legs, he mostly only does his business on our walks, which happen twice per day.

Like the majority of the country, the northeast has been hit with a vicious heat wave.

Up until Sunday, we were managing walks ok.  Morning walks are tolerable, although I can’t say I’m a fan of boob sweat or swamp ass at 5:30 in the morning, but at least the temps are in the 70’s.

Sunday was supposed to be the worst day, but we managed a morning walk just fine. In the afternoon it got blazing hot.  It was 98° at 5:00 pm.

When it’s super hot and humid, I modify our afternoon walks. By modify I mean, I usually shorten them, or wait until the sun has started its descent so the pavement is cooler, and we walk uphill, where the shade is.

I thought if I drove the dogs up to the woods, we would have some relief from the heat, and Sampson could enjoy a walk in one of his favorite places. It would mean shortening Delilah’s walk, but with her heart issues, I was fine with that. I brought some water with me, and gave them both water every couple of minutes.

By the time I realized this wood walk wasn’t a good idea, it was too late, we were already at the turn around point. My first clue was the way Sampson was lagging behind, but he was sniffing and Delilah was pulling so I missed that signal.

Then he lay down on the path. Shit! We had to turn around and head back home. It was all down hill so I thought he’d be okay.  (In retrospect, I should have called Hubby and had him meet us at the top, but that’s in retrospect.) By the time we were approaching the car, Sampson’s back end was giving out, he had that sloping walk that today’s GSD’s have and every time he stepped on his bad leg, his hip sank. I was afraid he was going to collapse.

I helped him into the car, and watched his ‘good’ leg knuckle. I just about threw up at that point. I gave him some more water, and drove home.

I got him out of the car and coaxed him to the back door, and pounded on the door for Hubby to come out and help him. He got him about three feet inside the door, and he lay down again. He was panting really hard. (Sampson, not Hubby. Hubby was smart, Hubby stayed inside.)

Hubby brought the water bowl over to him, and gave him some water, then he moved the fan so it was blowing on him.  We had the air conditioning on, but it was so hot, that the air inside the house was still in the upper 70’s to low 80’s.

A cool, refreshing drink.

I wanted to take a quick, cool shower, so I left Sampson in front of the fan.

While I was in the shower, I was thinking about Sampson. We don’t have a bathtub that is low enough for him to climb into, so I contemplated bringing him in the shower with me, but I was afraid of him slipping on the tile and hurting himself.  I wished we still had the little wading pool.  Lying in the little pool would help him cool down. I thought about the times on our hikes, when he would put his belly in the stream.

Then a light bulb went off, and I thought, “A cool, wet towel on his tummy!”

I hopped out of the shower, grabbed a hand towel and soaked it with cool water.

Sampson was still lying on his tummy, so I rolled him onto his side and draped the towel over his stomach. The fan was positioned to blow on him, but he was still panting.

I finished my shower, and checked on him again. The towel was still cool, and he was still panting.

I texted Jen, “Help, I fucked up.”

She asked if I’d taken his temperature.

I’m embarrassed to say, I don’t even have a thermometer.

She told me to not let the towel absorb his body heat. To keep checking it and refreshing it, so it stayed cool.  She also said I could rub his gums with an ice cube, and cool his paw pads with cool, but not super cold water.

By now, about an hour had passed and he wasn’t panting continuously, but in smaller increments. I tried rubbing an ice cube on his gums, but the little shit ate the ice cube. I took the towel and wiped his paws.

I felt like the crisis had past, but I didn’t encourage him to move. I was concerned about feeding him his dinner, but he stood up fine and didn’t seem to be having the same problems with his legs.

While we were eating our dinner, he got up and moved into the living room.

I don’t think it was heat stroke, or heat exhaustion, but I do think for Sampson the heat and exercise was just too much for him. I told Hubby, “From now on, when it’s that hot, walks will be after the sun goes down, and if it’s still too hot, it will just be enough to do their business.

Moral of the story, don’t walk your dog when it’s almost 100°, it’s not worth their life. Or the time you shave off your own, thinking you killed your dog.

For some great tips at keeping your dogs cool during the hot months, check out what Jen had to say on this My Brown Newfies post.

 

One Way to Reduce Toxins in You and Your Dog’s Lives

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One of the topics I’d really like this blog to be known for, is my natural approach to treating my dogs. From supplements, to food, to medical treatments, I will always seek out a natural approach.  Of course, there are times when the natural approach isn’t a good fit for whatever we have going on. Things like Tapeworms. UGH.

Do we have to talk about THAT again? You get one little worm and you never hear the end of it.

For a while now, I’ve been thinking about a series where I share with you, the ways I work to reduce my, and the dog’s exposures to toxins in our lives. Let’s face it, our environments, our world is filled with toxins. We are exposed to thousands of them every day, whether it’s in the air, our home, the products/food we use, or our water.

For years we’ve been told that bottled water is safe. But I recently read a post by the BBC where a report uncovered that almost all bottled water has particles of plastic in them, and while there was no evidence of harm posed by these small particles, I prefer to not ingest them. I also prefer my dogs don’t ingest them.

Of course, there are times and areas of the world, where you may well have to drink from plastic bottles, but whenever possible, I prefer to filter my water myself.

For the last 12 years, I’ve worked in the field of engineering. I learned a lot. One of those things was how our water is processed and treated. While I understand the need for the process, I don’t have to like it.

I would even suggest people with wells, also filter their water.  There are all kinds of chemicals and toxins that seep into the ground through rain and natural processes, and it’s just better in my opinion to take as many precautions as you can.

We have city water. Turn on the faucet and you get a strong smell of chlorine, I like to eliminate that chlorine if possible, so I filter it.

Ways to Filter Your Water

Plumbed water filtration systems – We looked at water filtration systems that were plumbed right into the house. Our local home improvement store had two different kinds. One that filtered just the sink you were using and one that filtered all the water for the home. We ultimately did not go with either at the time, as we have too many projects on our plate, but my ideal would be a system for the whole house. That way, I’m reducing the toxins ON my body, as well as the toxins I’m putting IN my body.

Faucet Filters – Before we got our long-neck faucet, we had a Brita filter on the sink. I always had a pitcher of filtered water on the counter, so I could easily refill the dog’s water bowl when there was a need. Then I would refill the pitcher so it was ready the next time I needed it.

Filter Pitchers – With our long-neck faucet, the Brita filter no longer fits, so I bought a Brita pitcher instead. I keep the pitcher on the counter, just like before, and I also have a couple of one quart mason jars filled with water, right next to it. Whenever I fill the dog’s water bowl, I dump another quart into the Brita pitcher.

Rent a filtration system – There are also companies that rent water filtration systems. Where I work, we have a water ‘cooler’ plumbed into our line. It is always full, always filtered water. They will come out and change the filters or unit, once a year. My daughter also rented a system where the water came right out a faucet on the sink.

Boil your water – As for cooking, I do not filter water when I use it for cooking. Mostly because any large amount of water I use, would be boiled, and we all know, boiling water is a great way to sterilize it. SO, that being said, if you don’t have the means to filter your water another way, you could always boil it, and let it cool before drinking.

Today’s post is the first in a series of ways to reduce the toxins and chemicals you and your pet are exposed to.

Wonder what her next topic will be? Your guess is a good as mine.

Do you have any tips to reduce toxins in your life or are there any topics you’d like covered?

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