Mouse in the House!

Eeek!!  Yes, I actually made that noise the other day...  My youngest was playing in the playroom and ran to tell me that she saw something "with feet and a tail" run under the recliner in there...  My husband is at work and my eldest daughter was in her room with her door closed.  I called to her - my other brave helper when Daddy is not home! - and said, "Can you come here and help Mommy with something?"  She said, "Sure!  What is it?"  I said, "I think there's a mouse in the playroom!"  And she said, "Yeah, I'm going to stay in my room then!"  Sigh.  Should have seen that coming!  I went in with a broom and when it scurried by me I screamed like a little girl (or little boy, as my eldest used to say when she was younger -- so cute!)!  The dog went into attack mode - against the BROOM, not the MOUSE!  She really hates the broom - almost as much as she hates the vacuum!  The mouse went behind the Barbie house and I tried to be brave and shoo it out the door and out of the house, but no luck.  When it darted by me again -- about 2 inches of cuteness, I'll be honest -- I screamed again and decided it was best to seal off the room (close the glass slider) and never go in there again (until my husband came home and took care of it!)!  I called him at work and told him we needed to move again!  I am nothing if not totally cool under pressure... 

He forgot to bring mousetraps home (have a heart kind -- my littlest dolly did NOT want us to kill the mouse -- just get it out of her playroom!), so we left the door closed until the following night (last night).  Yesterday afternoon, while the dog was sleeping peacefully -- hard to believe her obnoxiously loud SNORING did not wake her up -- the mouse came out of hiding and was lying in a sunny patch of carpet in the playroom -- totally toying with me, I just know it!  I felt like I was at the zoo, because the door is glass and so I sat in the kitchen and watched the mouse like it was an exhibit.  It woke up and darted about here and there and eventually laid down in the middle of the carpet again.  My girls got home shortly after that and my eldest just shuddered as she walked by, but the youngest watched it and then informed me that she thought it was dying!  I think she noticed it's breathing slowing, and it did not move from that spot.  By the time my husband got home, we were certain that it was dead.  My little one was happy that it was out of her playroom (don't worry, she has not been in there yet -- I did a THOROUGH Lysol-ing, absolutely coated everything in there with Lysol but I wanted to wait until it dried and then go in and do a thorough vacuuming and dusting!!), but my sweet girl was sad that the little mouse had died.  We talked about it reminding us of Stuart Little because we are certain (mouse droppings...) that the little guy was hanging out in the second floor of her Barbie house!  (Lysol-ed!!!)

We are living in the country, essentially in a forest, in the mountains...  It's getting colder...  I'm afraid this will not be our last uninvited guest!  Ugh.