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Post by howardsgirlfriend on Jan 18, 2010 15:04:43 GMT -5
I don't know whether this helps anyone else, but I found that composting helps me clean out the fridge and keep the dishes clean, because I don't feel like a failure for allowing food to spoil--I'm helping the environment instead! Since I compost almost all of my food waste, my trash doesn't smell so bad, or pile up so much, either.
For me, the more options for getting rid of stuff, the better.
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Post by messyjedi on Jan 18, 2010 15:13:25 GMT -5
Hopehope, you rock my socks!! You go girl!
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Post by messyjedi on Jan 18, 2010 15:14:31 GMT -5
So when this thread began, I posted that I would cheer but couldn't participate because mine were done. Now after a crazy overscheduled several days, I am back with a kitchen full of dirty dishes. I am back in to fight along with you for a couple of days.
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Post by illuminata on Jan 19, 2010 1:03:00 GMT -5
crazycatlady!!! I am hijacking your thread to tell you how happy I am to see you! (and then I'll wash some dishes!)
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Post by Evelyn on Jan 19, 2010 2:13:26 GMT -5
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Post by littleengine on Jan 19, 2010 14:50:15 GMT -5
I am slowly chipping away at the backlog of dishes that I had brought back upstairs. The worst offenders have been washed (i.e. the rotting fish pot and the rotting chicken soup pot). Some of the other dishes are soaking in the sink; the rest are still in a dining room corner, covered with a tablecloth.
However, there are still many more stashed dishes in various other locations, once I get these done. I fell Saturday night and cut my hand on a bread knife in one of my dish stashes (and broke a mug too).
The fruit flies in my sink area are really out of control. I keep killing them but they just breed and breed. I've never had fruit flies in January, it's crazy.
Good job you guys who are working on your dishes! And thanks for bumping this thread up again--a good reminder to tackle the dishes again.
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Jan 19, 2010 15:05:17 GMT -5
-
Hairspray is a good quick emergency way to kill fruit flies.
It doesn't solve the problem, but it can make your time in the kitchen bearable while you're in process of getting to the root of the problem.
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Post by midlife on Jan 19, 2010 15:17:46 GMT -5
LittleEngine, here's something that I keep meaning to try with my kids: make them eat at the table (instead of on the sofa watching TV, which is what mine mostly do), and then they don't even need dishes, depending on what you serve! If lunch is PB&J sandwiches plus graham crackers and bananas, for example, the sandwiches can just sit right on the (clean) table, and you can just pass the box of crackers around and they can hold one in their hands and eat it. Total dishes: one knife, and everyone's cups. (No way to avoid the cups, unless you put in a drinking fountain! :-D) Wiping down one table can sometimes feel a lot easier than washing five separate plates.
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Post by CaringFriend on Jan 19, 2010 15:31:00 GMT -5
....the sandwiches can just sit right on the (clean) table Great idea! In a situation such as this, another choice is to buy the cheapest paper napkins possible. Have the children open them all the way and lay their sandwiches on those. The used napkin with crumbs rolled up inside can then be trashed. I know that some people place food directly on kitchen counters. I avoid doing that. When I have to use a cutting board or need to cut something small, I do so on a paper plate instead. Then discard the paper plate and there is no cutting board to be washed. Edited to enlarge words in quote for easier reading.
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Post by Evelyn on Jan 19, 2010 16:34:45 GMT -5
Sympathy for your cut hand - what a drag! And congratulations on cleaning up the "worst offenders" - good for you! (And pay no attention to all the other "stashed" dishes - at least not until you're ready to deal with them, which is not now.) The fruit flies in my sink area are really out of control. I keep killing them but they just breed and breed. I've never had fruit flies in January, it's crazy. Some of the fruit flies are probably flying into the soapy soaking-water and dying, which I always find extremely vindicating. You can also make quick impromptu fruit fly traps by putting one or more drops of dishwashing liquid in the bottom of a cup or other dish - clean or dirty doesn't matter. Add enough apple cider vinegar (the cheapest kind will do) to cover the bottom about "half a finger" deep. The fruit flies are attracted to the vinegar smell, but the soap messes up their wings and so they're stuck. Toss out & replace the vinegar-with-soap every 1-3 days - unless you've aleady washed the dish. Whoo-hoo on your dishwashing progress!!!
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Post by midlife on Jan 19, 2010 17:21:33 GMT -5
Inspired by this thread, I went to put away last night's dinner dishes, and when I got to the bottom of the dish drainer, I noticed a tiny plant sprouting out of the garbage disposal!
!!!
We don't use the disposal because we compulsively compost all food waste (if you can call it composting, when the raccoons and possums just climb into the bin and eat it all), so the disposal just sits there at the bottom of the half of the sink that holds the drainer. And so we hardly ever clean that half of the sink, because all that gets put in it is the clean dishes. (But yes, it's all bleary with soapy water droplets -- Flylady would be so sad!)
I gently pulled on the plant... the sprout was around four inches long, and at the bottom was a lentil, with a nicely-branched three-inch root system!
Plants are tough!!
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Post by illuminata on Jan 19, 2010 18:37:14 GMT -5
Okay, I took up your challenge, and got my dishes all washed up! I didn't wash them last night because at about the time I sat down to eat my own supper, the puking started, and once I got into doing puky laundry I didn't feel like dealing with dishes. But they're all clean now...ready for me to cook supper and make moar!
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Post by Evelyn on Jan 19, 2010 19:35:06 GMT -5
...all clean now...ready for me to cook supper and make moar! You reminded me of something my grandmother used to say - After a Grand Campaign to wash up every dish in the house, just as you're finally sitting down for a very well-deserved rest, you're just about bound to see one last dirty dish or cup that you somehow missed. Whenever this happened, Grandma, an nth-generation farmwoman, would philosophically remark: "Well, you've always got to keep at least one for seed."
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Post by howardsgirlfriend on Jan 19, 2010 22:21:05 GMT -5
Too bad we couldn't just load them into a pickup truck and run it through a car wash.
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Post by def6 on Jan 19, 2010 22:36:00 GMT -5
I just want you guys to know that I admire your candor in describing what your reality is in your own kitchens. It is descriptions like these that really motivate me to address my own issues. Thanks a lot! .......As for me and my kitchen sink. I Do follow Fly Lady's instructions on shining your sink, it is a healing process. As for my dishes, I wash by hand(dishwasher is broken) I try very hard to wash dishes while l am cooking and I refill the dishpan with hot water and detergent ready for the dishes that we are eating dinner off of. I do take my own dishes to the sink when I get through eating, wash them and let them dry in the dish drainer. Then I gently rally my family members(4) to do the same. Sometimes DH will actually do his but not often. It has taken me a lifetime to learn this kind of discipline for myself and my children- sometimes rules are for a reason.
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