Good evening everyone, all 502 of you (woo hoo! The pixies are as excited as me that we've finally cracked the big five-oh-oh club ☺). I'm just about to tune into my two e-courses but wanted to share a snippet of what's happening on Planet Baby at the moment.
We have a mouse in the house! And it's not this little cross-stitched one I made for India, either.
No, it's the real, live, squeaky, smelly and disgusting type.
Or to clarify, we have a mouse *problem*.
The discovery
A few weeks ago, we opened a kitchen drawer to discover a strange smell and what Joshie identified as 'mouse scat' - he learnt that word at school! Thorough cleaning ensured. No sign of the culprit, though.
The grand plan
With Mr PB's assistance, the pixies soon constructed an ingenious mousetrap involving string tied to a piece of cheese hidden under a saucepan they had propped up which was meant to drop and catch the mouse eating the cheese.
To their dismay, it didn't work.
The capture
However, the next day when emptying the rubbish, Mr PB discovered the pesky critter in the bag. He promptly tied it up and took it outside to the rubbish bin. End of story - he was so proud of himself!
The great return
A little too presumptuously, however. The mighty mouse loved PB HQ so much, he managed to gnaw his way out of the bag and return to the scene of his crimes.
More scats were identified. A mouse trap was purchased. The pixies baited it with bacon and left it in *my room of my own* where we'd actually seen the pesky little blighter scurry about.
And there it sat for two days, with nary a nibble. We assumed it had made an Elvis-like exit.
The end
Then poor Miss India discovered a foul smell in her room. A thorough investigation by Mr PB discovered the mouse had hopped into her little wire basket filled cabinet. He'd made a terrible mess. One of her treasured fabric covered beanbags had been chewed and emptied of its grain filling. It took an hour to clean it all up.
The mouse-trap was set in her room with a huge hunk of cheese.
The poor poppet had nightmares of the mouse crawling over her face whilst asleep and ended up sleeping with us.
When morning dawned, one full-bellied mouse was found, snapped in the trap. There was jubilation. Thankfully, it was disposed of before I awoke.
And that, my friends, was the end of the tale (get it?!).
Or so we thought.
This morning, I entered India's room. And smelt that horrid mousey smell. Drats!
I pulled open the wire basket and was greeted by this familiar sight. Yep - the beanbags had been targeted again! Another cleaning frenzy ensued.
Then I sat down to repair the damage.
Out came my favourite Mason jar with its pretty threads.
And my trusty Clover scissors and my treasured needlecase. I set to work. The beanbags were repaired, washed and placed somewhere the mouse won't be able to reach them.
Mr PB has set the mouse-trap in Miss India's room. With cheese. And now we wait - what will the morning bring?!
Do any of you have any tips for us? Everywhere else in the house has been spared. We are mystified as to how two mice could separately hunt down the wheat-filled beanbags in the entire house, after entering from the outside. Should we call in a pest controller? Or is there something more humane we should be trying? I'd love to hear your tips!
