Repurpose

Tale of a repurposed diaper pail
Overall, the switch in our kitchen to composting food scraps has been an easy one. The only slight snag has been that Avery can't reach the compost bin until she takes it all the way off the counter, which is both fraught with risk and a pain in her adorable little buttocks. However, I may have just found a solution that allows me to repurpose the diaper pail.

We bought the motion detector diaper pail. The one you wave your hand over and it opens up automatically. Of course, we couldn't use that feature because every time the dogs would stand in front of it  and wag their tails, that sucker would pop open, which just meant the house was stinky if the dogs were happy. Anyway, I've had a hard time getting rid of it because I just felt like we could use it for something. I am not one to hold onto stuff for "just in case." But I do hold onto things that I just have a feeling about. I went out to the garage this morning and saw the diaper pail and it hit me! Diapers are smelly and food scraps can be smelly; diapers need a bin and so do food scraps; Avery needs to be able to reach the compost bin and the diaper pail is the perfect height! I've lined it with a paper bag for the moment. If this bin works well, I'll look into getting compostable plastic bags that are large enough for it. Or maybe the paper bag will work just fine. I haven't been bothered or annoyed at all with washing out the small plastic bin that I know lots of people line with the compostable bags.

Pick it up or lose it
I'm attempting to institute a new policy in an effort to keep the clutter to a minimum. Avery loves little toys and little pieces of crap treasure. I find them everywhere. It's driving me batty. Last night I explained to her that she would have five minutes to tidy up any toys laying around or out of place in three locations: downstairs, upstairs, her room. For each location, she gets five minutes to tidy up, then I come in and sweep through and pick up anything she's missed or didn't pick up because she got distracted playing. Those things go in a box. She cannot have anything in the box back until she puts away ALL things in the box. I'm quite sure it's going to be a very full box.

It's so hard for me to come up with a system to get her to follow because I'm terrible about leaving things laying around. I'm neat in the sense that, when I clean up, I clean up completely. Everything must have a place, however, I'm terrible at keeping things in their places on a regular basis. But I'm determined not to pass this trait down to Avery. Or at least to maybe make her a little more likely to not leave a trail of stuff behind in her wake as I do.

We'll see how well it goes. We'll see if I can stick to it. Most importantly, we'll see if I can find a box large enough.

Walking & Food Logging
I'm still doing very well with my daily walking. Go me! I'm also sticking to my food logging. While I do go over my calorie goal maybe 25-30% of the time, it's usually not by much, and it definitely decrease how much I'd go over if I weren't tracking. My weight loss has plateaued for the moment, but I'm not discouraged by it. I think because I feel better overall. The 8 lb I've lost since my high were some uncomfortable ones.