Mousehunt, Litwiller style

Let me just start this post by stating that I hate mice. I've never considered myself to be a real squeemish person and I can trap/kill insects with the best of them, but mice....**shudder**....that I can't handle. The events that took place yesterday prove it.

Thursday night, Rob was cooking up a snack in the kitchen for his darling wife when he saw something scoot across the floor and go under the oven. He told me he saw something that was either a small mouse or a large insect. He pulled out the stove and starred down the small, furry creature. It then scurried it's way into the cabinet with our baking pans. Yikes! We thought that it got into the house when the boys were taking out recyclables. We haven't seen any mice in over two years so we didn't think we really had a problem.

I came downstairs the next morning, hoping to hear that the trap set in the night had caught the mouse and the problem was solved. What I found instead was a note that read, "Sorry, I haven't caught the mouse. He's still in the cabinet and I set the trap in there." Oooo-kaaay, I thought, now I have a mouse in my cabinet...alive. And at some point during the day, he's going to crave peanut butter and I'm going to hear that trap snap and possibly hear a mouse thrashing about. EEEEWWW!!! I did the dishes that morning, muttering under my breath about my husband's lack of mouse-cathing skills. Then I realized it's not HIS fault the thing didn't eat the peanut butter last night! I pulled the wooden recycle bin in front of the cabinet so the kids wouldn't open it and check and figured I could handle life until Rob came home at 2pm to dispose of the invader.

And then at about 11am, I was sitting at the dining room table at the laptop when I saw a brown furry body come out from under the piano and then run back under when it heard me scream. I jumped onto the chair, which made Matthew panic and jump onto the couch. Even Ben, my tough one, freaked out and I yelled, "That's it! We're leaving!" Matthew ran upstairs to grab socks, I threw a diaper in my purse, and we high-tailed it out of there. Having no vehicle (we only have one) I was rather limited in my options, but I decided since it was close to lunch, we'd go to McDonald's. I was shaking the entire time and I didn't calm down until the end of the meal. Wow. I don't know when I have ever panicked so badly!

We also walked around ShopKo and let Ben pick out some things with his birthday money (and they watched Up for awhile on all of the TV's) and then went to Walgreens. By then it was 1:30, so we decided to go home and run quickly upstairs. We read books and ate candy until Rob came home. He and Ben did discover that the mouse trapped in the cabinet was dead....which means I saw a DIFFERENT mouse. AAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Since all of the pans had to be scrubbed clean, we went out for supper to Upper Krust (the boys choice.) It was delicious, calmed us all down, and we headed back home. I made a deal with Rob that I would reorganize the study by myself if he would scrub down the kitchen. He worked on that for a bit while the kids and I watched a movie. Then he set a trap in the closet near where the second sighting happened. And he found a dead mouse in the trap right before bedtime. So he set another trap overnight and guess what? We caught ANOTHER mouse!!!! All the rain we've had must have driven them inside.

Today we'll be going out to purchase one of those soundwave things in hopes that we can drive away these unwanted pests. Cause Momma can't take no more mouse sightings!!!