Things I Love To Share...Kind Of...

When the kids moved out I let them take all of their bedroom furniture I then converted the bedrooms into spaces for me...when they came home I had inflatables...

 however,the cats made short work of them, as they stretched flexing their built in swords they sliced and diced and the sleeper awoke laying on the floor...

No worries I also had folding mattresses.

 What did I hear a collective moan? Or was that just my kids groaning.....hmmmm. Anyone who has had to spend the night on a folding bed or a sofa bed knows that little bar in the middle is just killer...my kids opted to sleep in the recliner and on the floor. This just won't do! So I started a redo... I finished my guestroom with gusto!     

But then there was the issue of who got to sleep in it

I want my kids to come home and feel like they are home when they do.So I started on converting my art studio back into another bedroom.

I bought a second mattress set and the Mr and I fought it up the stairs and into the room. We managed to figure out how to set up the frame and got it in there... YAAAAY the project was started!

I checked the room for stray pets and closed the door. Leaving the set in there for the remaining treatments...

But I was not prepared for the treatment it got....

Let me explain...

The next day my husband and I got up early and took off to Lincoln to see the kids.

We were going to spend the night because we were looking for R.V.'s. We were driving my son's truck...

 but the truck broke down..sounds like a kiddie song huh..

I am lucky because the Mr.can fix things and he fixed the truck and got it running again, but the R.V. money was gone this is my sad face here :( .

So we came home instead,however it was really late and we went straight to bed. The next morning I hear cats (plural) meowing. Which is never a good thing...I have found them in linen drawers, in cupboards and cabinets...I know they crawled in and fell asleep. Some conscientious person saw it opened and closed the cat trap, when the cat wakes up and realizes it can not get out it starts screaming LET MEOWWWWT! 

So I head to all the usual places, then it hits me..OH NO! I open the guest room and the first thing that hits me is the two cats as they escaped,

The Culprits:

Xaynee (The Misfit)

Mysty (The Lover)

The second was the smell. Prominently in the middle of the bed was their "Thanks" for locking us in here, this is for you gift.OH CRAP! literally. My first reaction was to throw the mattress away and buy a new one because not only did I have the special package on it, they had also pee'd and cat urine is one of the hardest smells to get rid of.

I am going to share what I did and which treatments worked and did not work.

I have to tell you that through out this whole ordeal I wanted to toss the mattress and buy a new one. But we don't have the funds, it would have been a lot more fun to drive down the interstate and toss the money out of the car window, then to deal with this,yet I had to find a solution.

I have always heard the vinegar is the miracle solution that cleans and neutralizes urine, so I first used that. I poured some in my Bissell Little Green Machine and went to work... It didn't do it. All I got was a cat pee-y vinegary nastiness that made it hard to stay in the room. I do not give up easily so I poured a gallon of vinegar on it with a bucket of water and then I sucked it all up... all I got was a soppy sick smelling mess. When it dried it smelled just as bad as before.

So I went to Earl Mays and bought a pet odor neutralizer that cost A LOT and did not work.Again it smelled just as bad as before, with a new twist since it now was a pee-y, vinegary, perfume-y horribleness.Wanting to give up but not able to, I went to Menards where the Mr. and I sniffed our way through the cleaners and settled on Shout Carpet Spot and Stain Remover. We chose that one because it did not have a perfume to it, the scent was clean and neutral. I sprayed it on and let it dry. The Perfume and vinegar smell was gone but not the urine. I stuck my nose down on the bed and I could still smell that cat pee. OH BOTHER! So then I went to Walmart and bought Bissell's OXYPRO plus their 2X Ultra Pet Stains for Compacts along with Woolite's Pet+ Oxygen. I was going to war with this smell! First I saturated it, I mean I sprayed it good with the Woolite and I scrubbed it in. Then I used the Little Green Machine with the 2X Ultra Pet solution. And I finished with the OXYPRO. I left it for 2 days to dry completely. Then I gave it the nose test, and you know what IT WORKED! There was nothing there OOOOOOOO YAAAAY I WON! I went  ahead and gave it another good spray with the OXYPRO and let it dry just to be sure.

 Because I am super reluctant to put my kids in a bed that the cats had used as a litter box.  I got one of those wet proof bags and zipped it in, then I added a foam mattress topper and Beautyrest Hotel Luxury Pillow Top mattress pad on top of that. Next came a new set of sheets, quilt and  comforter. My daughter slept on it last night which was the real test  because her nose knows,if you know what I mean...and I passed the test. She said that it was a comfy, cozy bed and she loved sleeping there. WOO HOO! I can not say for sure which product did the trick, I  suspect it was the combination of the last three that gave the mess the final heave hoe! But I would say they all get my THUMBS UP!

                                                                  

Products I used: