The Christmas Mouse

A couple nights after Mike got here, and after everyone else had gone to sleep, Mike stood quietly in his room texting, when out of the corner of his eye he saw something little and grey scurry out of the hall and into the little opening under the sliding door. To confirm his suspicions he placed a piece of cheese just outside the opening. The next morning it was gone.

Great. We have a mouse in our house. My utter horror at this thought was not shared by Mike or Chris. They were up to the challenge of capturing our Christmas mouse. Night two, after everyone else had gone to sleep, Chris and Mike set up their trap. Old school... shoe box, pencil, string and a piece of cheese. They set it up by the opening under the door and quietly waited for 41 minutes for it to emerge. It went for the cheese, they pulled the string and down went the box. They were thrilled. Then during their celebrations the mouse found a little round hole in the box... one that was clearly part of the design of the box but was not 'punched out' yet. The Christmas mouse punched it out and scurried under the kitchen cupboard.

Chris and Mike were now both frustrated and even more pumped up. They had been SO close. Night three and the set up the box trap the same way. Chris waited up for a while but finally decided to go to bed. It was Mike alone manning the trap. Sometime around four in the morning the Mice emerged but didn't go into the trap. No worries. Mike had lined the doorway with a row of presents. The mouse headbutted the presents several times, ran into the bottom stair and then ran past Mike into his room. Mike grabbed the box and tried to slam in down on top of him missing closely several times. The mouse escaped into the bathroom cupboards.

Each morning we were eager and a little disgusted to hear the report. Mike felt the thrill of being a 'hunter' and had big plans for Night four but it never emerged... at least not while he was up.

Night five was Christmas Eve. Our cute little Christmas mouse (they told me it was cute... 'shudder') had evaded them once too many. They bought traps and set them up.

Christmas morning there was an extra little present waiting for us in the pantry which Mike took care of before anyone was up. Thank you Mike! He of course took a picture of it but I thought this cartoon mouse was so much cuter.

Obviously I was not up at 3:00 every night so I apologize if the facts are a little off. All I know is that while we had a wonderful Christmas our Christmas mouse did not.

(we set traps the next couple of nights as well... looks like our Christmas mouse was living alone HOPEFULLY!)