Aiden and the missing stuff

Aiden loves the trash can. I mean LOVES the trash can. I don't know what it is about it but he loves it. We have a big trash can in our kitchen and little ones in all of our bathrooms (like most normal households). The ones in the bathrooms need to be emptied the second anyone puts anything in there because he picks those up and carries them around. Loves to carry the trash cans! The big trash can in the kitchen is more of a problem. He can't pick it up but he loves to try and pull everything out of it (if the trash is full enough to do so) or put stuff in the trash can. This trash can has a plastic top to it but it's pretty much useless because aiden can take the top completely off so there's no point to it. Every day I wish we had a trash compactor or even one of those fancy metal trashcans that he wouldn't be able to get the top off of but we don't so we play battle with the trash can all day every day. Here's the kicker. Aiden loves to put stuff in the trash can. He will throw ANYTHING in there. Our shoes, his toys, hangers, his bottle, anything and everything that he has access to....goes in the trash can. We figured this out a little bit too late. After we had thrown stuff away because we failed to check what Aiden might have put in the trash. He has thrown away his monitor. Yes he used to carry it around all the time and then it was just completely gone and now we have to just hope we can hear him from downstairs (don't worry we can) but it's still sad because that wasn't cheap. He has thrown away our TV remote. It's not the worse remote he could have thrown out because we still have the cable remote and the DVD remote but if we want to do anything on the TV itself we have to get up to do it now. He has thrown out basically all my coasters. I used to have 10 now I have 4. He has thrown out I don't even know how many of his balls. In case you weren't at his birthday party my parents got him tons and tons and tons of balls and he has all these other balls from different games and he carries them around everywhere and then they end up in the trash! Now those are the things we lost for good because we didn't yet know the game. Now we are better, we check the trash and get the shoes, toys, bottles, remotes, whatever OUT of the trash before we TAKE it out. Now on to my story....

Saturday afternoon/ evening we had ben's parents over to watch the Mavericks game. In case you aren't watching (you should be) it was game 4 in the playoffs. Last night was game 5 and we won meaning we advance!!! Different story...sorry! So we had david and allison over for the game and to cook dinner (ben's dad and stepmom). We had a great time, I took some pictures, the Mavs won. We had a fabulous dinner. All is well. They helped us clean up the kitchen and david took the trash out. Of course he didn't know you must check the trash for things aiden might have thrown away and we didn't catch it at the time. So now 3 days have passed and I have been missing my camera. I have looked absolutely everywhere. Searched the house from top to bottom and it's just gone. The last time I know I had it was while the parents were over here. So it occurs to me this morning...it had to have gone in the trash. Luck be it that our trash was supposed to be picked up yesterday morning but my wonderful and sometimes forgetful husband forgot to put it out on the curb! Thank goodness! So today while aiden took his nap I got to go dumpster diving. Going through the trash has to be the MOST disgusting job in the world. There are just not words to describe the nastiness. Especially when you have a baby and there are just disgusting things in the trash...use your imagination. So I went through all like 8 bags of trash that we had out in our bin and....I found my camera! Along with 4 napkin rings, 2 napkins, 4 balls, and 1 coaster! I immediately took a shower and then checked to make sure my camera was still working (and it is) so I will upload some new pictures later on. In the meantime, I know they are expensive but I think it might be time for ben and I to invest in one of those fancy metal trash cans with the undetachable lids!

EDIT:
Ok so this is in follow up so that people can offer me advice. I LOVE that by the way! Grandma Karen had the idea of putting the trash can under the sink. In our house the cabinet space under our sink is very minimal. In fact my cleaning bucket barely fits under there. We have also tried putting the trash can in the laundry room and shutting the door. That worked for a while but now he knows how to open our doorknobs. Debbie posted a link to a trash can that locks. This is VERY similiar to what we currently have. The problem is that the TOP locks. So the opening of where you supposedly put in the trash and yes that was effective for a while. The problem is that the WHOLE LID comes off. Of course it would have to so you can empty the trash right? Aiden knows how to take the whole lid OFF which is why the lock on the top doesn't make that much of a difference. That's why I have resorted to that I am going to have to buy one of those super expensive metal kinds because the tops don't come off they like hinge open from the step thing but he wouldn't be able to take the whole lid off like he can with the plastic ones. If anyone has other ideas though I am ALL EARS cause the last thing I want to spend over a 100 bucks on is a TRASH CAN!!! The little monster after he has lid and lock off and is walking around proudly with the lid!