It's a squirrel...it's a ghost.....it's a.....?

So I was sitting here earlier tonight just a-typin' away, with the long fake nails clacking on the keyboard, and I heard it.

Chewing and scratching. And it was loud.

I couldn't tell where it was coming from, so I grabbed the broom and started tiptoeing around the living room - because a broom is going to protect me from all that is evil, right?

*snort*

Anyway - whatever it was, it was loud. Now, I've had issues with squirrels or something in my attic, but this sound came from floor level so if it was a squirrel, I had a real problem. And I've had issues with a ghost in here too (don't laugh - I'll tell that story at some point). And of course, I've had issues with mice.

I knew realistically it was a mouse, but it was kind of entertaining to come up with the crazy versions of what was happening too.

Anyway, I narrowed the sound down to the area around the couch, so I pulled it out from its spot.

Mice.

*sigh*

Honestly, I had hoped for the ghost or the squirrel. If it was squirrels, the professionals would be called in to deal with it, and I could just go hide somewhere until it was gone. Like it was really going to be a squirrel....

If it was the ghost...meh, I've been dealing with him for a while. He's annoying, but other than occasionally throwing random objects around the house or appearing as a flying .... thing ..... he's harmless. He doesn't really bother me all that much.

But no, it has to be a mouse. Which means that I have to get traps. And I have to set them. And then I have to deal with their little dead carcasses and all of the other crap that goes along with going on a mouse hunt.

And because I tend to go overboard at times, while I had the couch pulled out from its place, I decided to tear the bottom off of it to try to fix the padding that came away from the one arm of it. I don't know how in the heck it happened, but when I sit on *my* end of the couch, there is absolutely no padding on the arm of it - it's just the fabric and then the wood underneath it. And it sucks. So I tore the bottom of the couch apart (tried to put a screwdriver through  my hand in the process) and put the padding back in place over the wood. So much better to sit there now! And then of course I had to vacuum under the cushions. And mop under the couch.

In other news of the day, Daniel and I just basically hung out. I was (overly) tired from the bazaar yesterday, so we opted to stay home from church and relax this morning. I did some laundry and cleaning (go figure) and we just chilled. Later this afternoon, we took off to get some grease and salt at the only fast food joint in town that has a playground so he could run off some steam and I could sit and relax some more. Of course I sat there and made a to-do list and balanced my checkbooks too. But he played and had fun.

We went later in the afternoon, thinking that it wouldn't be busy, but it was packed. And loud. And full of kid who were completely obnoxious and unsupervised. Really though, I should have expected it to be packed since I went out dressed in full Domestic Goddess attire - oh yeah, I was *that* mom today. And I didn't really care.

After we left there, we took the van to the carwash to vacuum the past few months' worth of crap out of it. Oh, it was ugly. But I figured that while I only had one kid and already had some of the seats pulled out of it, this was the perfect time to do it. I have no idea how many times I had to put more quarters in the vacuum - I think at least 3 - but the interior was clean when we left. After we got home, I put the seats back into it and then worked on getting the rest of the craft stuff from the bazaar put where it belonged. I got invited to set up at another one in 2 weeks, so I'm trying to decide if I want to do that one or not. I guess ultimately it depends on if I can get someone to watch the kids.

I swear, there's never a dull moment around here.

Restlessness

Today has been another one of those days - I know that realistically, I should still be laying low and not running around like a lunatic even though I feel a little bit better. But I am so restless right now that I feel like I could crawl out of my skin. Actually I've been kind of feeling like that all day, so I decided to use the energy for good and clean up the kitchen. And I bleached just about anything that could be bleached, in the hopes of killing all of the cooties that are taking us out one by one...

I am not even going to post the pictures of what it looked like before, but suffice it to say that it was nasty.

Then the energy was transferred to finish cleaning up around my desk.

Of course, with this being Saturday, the day started out with basketball. Both of the girls were supposed to have games, but the team that Sarah was supposed to play against forfeited because they didn't have enough players - so that cut the chaos of the morning down considerably.

Emily's team really hustled today - they were definitely working together as a team. It is so neat to see how far they've progressed this season.

And although you can't tell from this picture....I snapped this in the instant before Emily shot and made her first basket! She's right there, in front of #14. It was a beautiful shot!

The final score was pretty sweet - for us.

So for the rest of the night tonight, I think I'm going to work on doing my nails and getting them into shape for the wedding that we're going to next weekend. I really wish that I wasn't such a nail biter, but I have been for all of my life, and the only way to stop it is for me to wear fake nails. Going to a salon and getting them done is expensive (not to mention next to impossible to schedule) so I got the stuff and I just do them myself. They don't look perfect, but they get me by, and they look better than the chewed-off nubs that I'm currently sporting.

Tomorrow, I think we're going to skip church - the boys are still hacking and coughing something fierce and I don't want to spread their cooties to the other kids, so we'll just stay home. I'm going to start tearing into the girls' room and get it thoroughly cleaned - and they may or may not be happy by the time they get back on Wednesday. I'm just tired of the mess, and if it means that I have to get in there and start packing crap away so that I can walk through without fearing for my life, then that's what I'm going to do. And they'll get over it.