Apartment Tour #3 + Zero Waste Cat Update

    

Now that we're moving, I thought I'd take a few last pictures of our apartment. The space was tricky to furnish and I never liked pastels much, but the items we chose complemented the view, and I never felt the urge to redecorate. Our next apartment is a complete departure. Since the previous zero waste cat post, our plastic litter box cracked and the bristles fell out of our Furminator. We switched to a stainless steel steam pan from La Bovida and Tender Care wooden brush; my husband also bought a Pipolino after seeing Kar and Toffel play with one at my brother in law's place. The cats love the new stuff. Despite my misgivings, the plastic feeder relaxes and entertains them, especially since they hid their wool mice somewhere. They really only play with ribbons and boxes anyway.



Other than that, and a mason jar for myself, we haven't made any household or wardrobe additions. Our new apartment comes furnished, so we plan on selling appliances and most of the furniture. I can't wait to live in a smaller place. The neighborhood is beautiful and safe and Léa Salamé lives next door, but the upkeep of this apartment is a little much- it takes me forever to scrub all the windows and pigeons fly at me when I do- plus it's flooded five times this year. Twice our bathtub emptied into our neighbors' kitchen, and last week our balcony flooded another neighbor's bedroom. I can't think of anything interesting or funny to write about this, because someone got gluten on my water glass and my internal fluids are consciously uncoupling from my body.

   

Sources

H&M linen sheets in light grey
Ikea Soderhamn Sofa
Habitat Kilo table
Kartell Componibili
Habitat Ikebana bed
Nkuku wire shelves
Weck jars
Ikea Elly towels, used as cloth napkins
Eames rocker
Copper mugs
Happy Pet cat tree
Paolo Galetto above the cat tree
Paris to Go

19 comments:

  1. Always love your posts! I am sorry to hear of the conscious uncoupling though, not fun at all! I have been devouring every post current and past, casually, for months. I have adopted some of your suggestions and am very happy with them! I still have to work on downsizing beauty/bathroom/wardrobe and household items. BUT I read you used to make your own soap! I made my own batch from olive oil and bought lye. It cured very brittle. I made liquid soap out of it and used it in the laundry today, to make dish soap with lemon essential oil and am thrilled!!!!! Looking forward to your continued blog and the new digs! Hope you are feeling better soon. xoxo

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    1. Thank you so much Kate :) That is so cool you made your own olive oil soap, the dish soap sounds lovely! I'm so happy some of the suggestions worked for you. Awesome!

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    2. I'm surprised you didn't get star treatment in your apartment due to the fact you keep it so clean! Any landlord would be happy to have you as tenants!!!! I also JUST washed my windows with just savon de marseille soap and water with a cotton cloth to scrub and one to buff dry - AMAZINGLY CLEAN! And it just smells fresh and clean! Bye bye windex! AND used the re decker kitchen scrub brush and a block savon de marseille for dishes. VOILA! Super clean without scrubbing! How did I not know this before?!?! LOVE going back to basics and the simpler way of doing things! My last 600g shower bar lasted me 6 months in the shower. CRAZY!!! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for the inspiration!!! (Hope you are feeling better)

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    3. That is so awesome! I couldn't believe it either when I switched; I was saving so much money on cleaning products but I felt like they were way more effective. Thank you for telling me!

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  2. I selfishly look forward to seeing your new digs, and hearing your explanation about what you do to compensate for this or that. Also curious about the smaller size and how you will utilise. The current place seems comfortably small, am really curious to see something smaller but still functionable. Also, doubly happy even you say it takes so much upkeep, even for a place of this modest size. Makes me feel like my attitude is t too far off the point for my place!

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    1. Thanks Cindy! The upkeep, apart from the windows, is actually because the landlords built this apartment all wrong and nothing works. We're always having issues with the hot water heater and the balconies and them accidentally turning the electricity and water off or the radiators not working, and our neighbors have these issues as well... plus our gardienne is unhelpful, so anytime there's a problem, we have to wait weeks for something to be done.

      The proprietors of the new apartment are really great and on top of things in a timely manner, and the condition of the apartment is great, plus we got to talk to the previous tenants so I'm confident it will have less problems than this!

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  3. 70 m² is palatial for Paris!

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    1. Hi Ji! It's weird, when I first moved here I thought our current apartment was small, I even wrote so on here, but after a few years in Paris it does seem palatial for two people, especially when I realized most neighbors with apartments this size have two bedrooms and four people living there... that's not even counting the 20m2 terrace + balcony space! Now that I'm used to Paris apartments I see how lucky we were in finding this place! Still I'm happy to live in something smaller :)

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    2. My sister-in-law (and family) lives in 140 sq m apt in the 14th. Is that considered super duper palatial? Lol.

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    3. Lol yes! Well for families it's perfect :) Outside of our neighborhood I know lots of three person families with 100 square meters, and they keep adding 20-50 or so square meters per person I think :D

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  4. I can't wait to see the new place! I am also gluten free, so I know the feeling of the current uncoupling. I'm so sorry you are going through that! Feel better! I have really enjoyed your blog, and I am making decisions to reduce waste because I am inspired by you. Bar soap and moving to glass returnable milk bottles for the kids milk (I only drink flax milk, which sadly does not come in glass bottles yet...) I also lived in Caen. :) I am back in the USA now. Thanks for everything you share! Marta :)

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    1. Hi Marta, thank you! Flax milk sounds so yummy. That is awesome you lived in Caen, how beautiful. What a great experience!

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  5. Hello Ariana, I have two cats also that I am trying to transition to zero waste. My question is about cat litter- what kind do you use and where do you find it unpackaged, please? Also, I've always heard you should have one more litter box than cats. Do you have two litter boxes and if so, where do you store the second one? In the bathroom? Ours is in our kitchen at the moment also, since our bathroom is too small and wet and our basement isn't finished. I worry about the hygiene of having a litter box in the kitchen but seeing yours makes me feel better!

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    1. Hello! I use silica litter. You can buy it unpackaged at Truffaut, Gwendog, and BHV in Paris; they have big dispensers you can put into a sealed bucket and return or they have an open bin you scoop the litter out of into your own container. But, I'm not sure that's the best option. I don't know if it's healthy or carcinogenic for the cats. I worry that the silica is uncomfortable under their little paws, but it's the only litter they seem to like. They hated wheat and corn litters, and I'm worried that those are unhealthy too, because of aflatoxin. Plus I'm not sure that wood pellets or litters don't have harmful phenols (they hate recycled paper litter too).

      I didn't want the litter box in the kitchen either, but it's away from food preparation areas and our bathroom is too wet also. I saw Chez Larsson had the litter box in the kitchen too, and she is so clean and tidy, so I figured it was ok :) We only have one. In my experience with multiple cats they use the same litter box anyway. In Cleveland we had three litterboxes for two cats and it was such a waste because they only used one.

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  6. You're amazing for downsizing!

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    1. You are so sweet! I think we will have a much better quality of life in a different neighborhood. The neighborhood we are moving to is so lively, and we go out that way to see our friends or on weekends anyway, so this just simplifies things :)

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    2. I'm a little late to responding :D You are 100% correct. My husband and I are house hunting in New England where real estate is not cheap. We prefer a colonial or farm style since we live in picturesque CT, but we looked at a few 800-900 sq ft homes. It's less to clean and we don't need so much "stuff" anyway! :)

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