Living with critters

I've just about had my fill (okay, yeah I've definitely had my fill) of animal life in my house. Lizards are the theme of the week. Anyone who knows me knows that I simply don't do reptiles. Of any kind. 

There was the lizard scurrying around the couch. Armed with a broom (I really need to look into better weapons I think), the boys and I chased him out from under the couch and slapped a cup on top of him. Well sort of. We missed...by about a lizard's tail width. 

As the cut off tail continued to wiggle and squirm, Matthew helpfully informed us that it was no big deal because the lizard's tail would just regenerate. Which prompted Nathan to ask what regenerate means. The boys had quite a conversation which included Nathan imagining how cool it would be to re-grow limbs. I pointed out that he'd have to lose one in order to re-grow one. Apparently it's still a cool idea. 

Once Merriam Matt Webster had us all on the same page, we decided to use a dust pan to slide under the cup (again, I really do need better tools for all of this critter catching that I have to do). Since letting the tail-less lizard escape was simply not an option, I was very careful to slide the cup up onto the dustpan without losing contact with the floor (and if that makes any sense at all to anyone else, congratulations). 

I ran to the front door and tossed the lizard out. He sort of looked okay, but not really. I think my sliding-onto-the-dustpan maneuver didn't go so well for the lizard. 

A few days ago our a/c went on the fritz. It's nice and cool in the evenings and so I opened a few windows so that the house would be livable. The first 2 windows I opened had lizards clinging to the screens. I slammed shut those windows and found one that at least for the moment was animal free. 

This past week I've also found these little skinny, black, crunchy bugs. They don't get to live IN my house. It's against my law.

Lastly, I was helping Nathan dress for soccer. I reached down to grab one of his shoes and a stupid lizard poked it's head out of the shoe and looked at me..then dove right back into the shoe. 

I am almost embarrassed to say I screamed like a girl and held the shoe out as far as my really long arms would reach. I ran to the front door (my new repository for all things with 4 or more legs) and proceeded to hand the shoe to Matt and told him to shake the lizard out. Yeah...I did. I panicked and gave it to my 11 year old son to handle. I just kept imagining it jumping out of the shoe and onto my arm. I knew the amount of therapy that would be needed after that would be at an astronomical cost. So yeah, I handed it off to Matt. 

In between laughing at me and shaking the shoe, he managed to get rid of the lizard. Now every time we have soccer, Nathan will hand me his shoe and say "Hope there's not a lizard in there mom...want me to open the front door?" Such a sweet little angel child. 

Lastly, and the reason I even sat down to write is that our paperwork has officially left TECO. It is at our agency and will arrive in Taiwan either tomorrow or Friday. The orphanage is anxious to get this show on the road so they will be initiating the court process quickly. We are thankful that we are over that last hurdle, and praying that the court process goes smoothly. 

Adoption is not for the faint of heart. Neither is catching lizards in your house.