Cleaning Those Muddy Puppy Paws

The first measure is to close your door to your baby. Yes, this sounds cruel and not good parenting at all, but this way you'll have time to receive the pup properly a cup of water in your hand. You'll introduce the dog's paw inside the cup, dissolving mist of the mud this way. Then use a rag or towel to dry it.

You could even use two cups and alternate, if your dog is the quiet type, that tends to hold still. So one paw would be in the water while you would dry/scrub the other with the towel. But really, all it takes is just submerging the paw in the cup for a couple of seconds, and scrubbing with the towel afterwards.

If you happen to have a hose within reach, even better. Just follow the same initial soaking steps, then hose down the paw of your pet, the water pressure will remove the mud very effectively after it has been softened by the water in the cup, and lastly, dry its paws with a towel.

If somehow you don't have the heart to close the door on your baby, or it's impossible to do for some reason, you can try a variation of this method: the fence. Put a fence between the front door and the rest of the house. Then just a small portion of the floors will be ruined, and you'll have time to clean your dog's paws before he leaves his marks.

Third choice: Carpeting. Using a dense front door carpet can make the difference here. Using what we learned from the previous method you could create a carpeting cleaning system, where one of the carpets will be a "cleaning" carpet, and the other a "drying" carpet. Take in consideration the materials: Dense, tall fibers will be better for capturing the mud.