The Continuing Saga of the Mouse Avenger

Posies by my doorstep, shining in the afternoon sun!

I needed a hearty-ish breakfast to start my day. At the same time, I’m doing that bouncy thing on the scale. I’ve lost the same two pounds twelve time in the last three weeks. I know what it is. I’m not working outside like I was all summer and you cannot expect to lose at the same rate when you aren’t burning off the calories. Also, the more weight you lose, the harder it is to lose more. That’s because your metabolism slows down. I hauling thirty pounds less fat around with me every day, so just walking the same pace I did when I was thirty pounds heavier isn’t going to cut it.

Mr. FixIt and I love grits. And, they are “Green” on the Noom list of foods so I’m encouraged to eat better. I watched Miss Brenda Gantt making her Southern Grits from Andalusia, Alabama and she puts a whole stick of butter and half a brick of cream cheese in hers. If I did that, they definitely wouldn’t be on the “Green Food” list, but ohhhhh, they would sure be scrumptious! I just cook them up in water with salt and a couple tablespoons of butter till they’re nice and thick.

Once the grits are done, I take them off the heat and put a lid on them. Then I fry a couple of eggs with the smallest amount of oil in the skillet… just enough to keep them from sticking. Mr. FixIt likes his eggs over medium so I cook his up first. Sometimes we have a little ham or turkey sausage with it, but we passed on the meat yesterday. I want to get those two pounds off for good this time! I like my eggs over easy and I put mine right on top of the grits and mix it all together. It’s laruppin’ good as my grandma used to say!

Neat as a pin, and not nearly as crowded as it used to be.

I finished washing all the cups and mugs that were in the cupboard that had the mice in it. I scrubbed down the cabinet itself, then lined the shelves with that cushioned liner. I think it lasts longer and it’s cheaper than all the others. I don’t like to use self-adhesive shelf liner. After awhile it just gets gummy and the heat and humidity in the kitchen can actually make it shrink a little. Then the adhesive around the edges gets dirty and it’s a mess. With the cushioned liner, you can easily take it out and spray it off if it gets dirty then put it back in when it dries.

I’ll trim that foam stuff off sometime this week. The cable is from an old under-the-cabinet TV.

Mr. FixIt brought me a can of that expanding foam spray that you use to fill gaps in things. It’s a really pain to work with and you sure don’t want to get it on you because you’ll have to wait till it wears off. I dropped a little on the counter, but I picked up the excess with a paper towel then used a nylon scrubby and some grease cutter and got it off before it hardened. I had a hard time getting the stuff to spray up into the cracks around the board that was over the hole in the top of the cabinet.

We’re going to paint the kitchen in the spring, so we’ll paint the interior of the cabinets and put new plywood shelves in them. For now, this will have to do. It’s clean and safe, so that’s all we need.

I found out the reason there was a hole in the first place was the roof leaked in that spot one time and Mr. FixIt had to get up in there to fix it. He had it up there good, but a mouse can get through the smallest space. I wore vinyl gloves while I was working with the spray foam so I just squirted it on my fingers and shoved it up in the crack. That works fine. Now, when it’s hard, I can go back with a knife and trim the excess off that expands out of the crack as it cures.

This isn’t all that’s going to Restore. But it’s a good start!

Once I had that all done, it was time to decide what was going to go back in the cabinet. I had already started the ball rolling by picking out three mugs I didn’t want anymore. We picked up each one and decided if we should keep it or let it go and I am so happy to say we filled a medium-sized tote full and I’ll take it to Restore for Habitat for Humanity. Now I can get back to the living room this week. I have already taken several tubs of camping stuff downstairs to the storage room and it’s looking better.

I have a boat load of things to do this week. It’s time to renew the tags on my truck, get it inspected, get the oil changed and tires rotated, and I need to have the transmission flushed. The furnace part should be in this week so hopefully the repair man will be here to put it in and it fixes the problem. We also need to take Mr. FixIt’s truck to the dump to empty some old building materials he’s gathered then he gets to do all the same things with his truck soon.

I looked around yesterday and thought how nice it will be when this is all finished and I can sit down and knit or make a quilt or bake cookies for the holidays or whatever my little heart desires. I never dreamed retirement would be this busy! I don’t know how I did all this plus work sixty hours a week and take care of my family.

But, before I start all that, I have knitting group this morning and I’m really looking forward to fellowshipping with my new friends. I hope your weekend was good and that you have something fulfilling to do this week!

🍁