new things around the house

We have some new items to make things simpler and easier around home.

I first saw these Swedish cellulose sponge cloths in Bon Appétit magazine. They looked as if they made a lot of sense, and Amazon had them in a variety of packaging configurations. The best way to describe them is to say that they are large, flat sponges. They work really well and can be thrown in the washing machine and reused. The best thing about them is that they have allowed us to cut back drastically on our paper towel usage. That is a Good Thing.

Then there’s our new compost bucket. A few years ago our trash and recycling company allowed us to include food waste in our yard waste Toter when they opened a new state-of-the-art facility that turned all of that stuff into natural gas and fertilizer. (Another Good Thing.) At the time they provided food waste buckets for the kitchen counter. Ours worked serviceably but was always somewhat awkward and unwieldy.  It finally reached the point where the lid would not stay upright as we were scraping food into it. I found this composting bucket on Amazon and bought it along with a roll of one hundred compostable liner bags. Simpler, cleaner, and easier.

Finally, there was that floor lamp in the bedroom. It had two circular fluorescent tubes which were a pain to replace, and it was not always easy to find the replacement tubes. When one burned out recently Terry suggested we replace the lamp. There was no argument from me. I found this LED floor lamp on Amazon which has a remote control and allows me to control both the brightness and the warmth of the light. It produces a brighter, cleaner light than the old fluorescent unit. I really love it.

A few little things that make domestic life easier and a little more pleasant here at home.