getting paint out of carpet

Well, my amazing little 16 month old decided to tip a gallon of purple paint over and all over herself and my carpet and a $250 Ikea rug. So I am giving you a tutorial on how to clean water-based latex paint from carpet! You will need: • An excuse to use this tutorial (i have a curious little toddler!) • a lot of towels that you don’t mind never seeing again • Tuff Stuff carpet cleaner (or similar) • A source of water nearby • A lot of calories burned!

to start, NEVER LET THE PAINT DRY. I was freaking out at first until I realized that I have to get the ball rolling if I want to get this stuff out! I poured cold water onto it , just enough to cover the paint. Get your towels ready because now is the time to start laying the towels down over the stain. Get down and start to scrub with the towel until the towel cannot hold anymore paint without smearing it. At first, you will need to run back and forth to the tub to consistently rinse and wring the towel out. Continue to pour small amounts of water onto the carpet and going over it with the wrung out towel. REPEAT as many times as necessary. When the bulk of the paint is out and the towels are no longer getting blotches of paint out, then grab a dry towel and cover the wet spot and get all of the moisture out of the carpet as much as possible. I did not have a steam clean to do this with, but it will come in handy right about now if you have one. Now, spray carpet cleaner onto the spot and start scrubbing with a clean towel or scrub brush. If you have beige carpet like mine, it will get 95% of the stain out. As you can see in the photo, there is some purple-ish tinting on the carpet but much better than before!