Bye Bye Birdie

Monday morning I was sitting at the computer when I heard this horrible scratching sound.  I paused the music and went downstairs to see if there was another bird in our wood burning stove.  There was no sound coming from there, so I went back to the computer.  A few minutes later, I heard it again.  Ali was sitting on the floor right by me, so I picked her up (she and I were both getting a little un-nerved about the weird sound coming from not very far away).  I looked down the hall and I saw something poking out of the air return vent in the hallway.  It was poking out about a 1/4" or 1/2" then back in and out several times.  At this point I started shaking and got very nervous.  I didn't even know what the heck I was going to be doing.  I just wanted out of my house and I didn't want to return until whatever it was, was gone for good.

I called up my friends (probably not anymore), Sarah and Andy Collette, Sarah answered and the first thing out of my mouth was, "is Andy home?"  Thank goodness he was.  I asked if he could come over and get whatever kind of critter it was out of my vents.  I was so freaked out at that point.  It was still making this horrible noise that made it even worse.  I e-mailed Jeff to tell him how scared I was.  I finally made it past the "whatever it was" into my room, shut the door and put something along the bottom of the door for protection (like that would work), I felt a little safer.  I climbed up on my bed and then Jeff called LAUGHING AT ME. I was a serious case at this point.

Andy showed up with his "gear" thinking it was a mouse.  He saw it right when he walked up the stairs, but then it went back farther so he couldn't tell what it was.  When the sounds kept coming, he figured it must be a bat or a bird because there was fluttering noises.  After a while of silence, we heard the stupid thing again, but this time coming from downstairs.  It had gone through the vents and ended up in the furnace.  After a lot of coaxing with some bread and a light, it walked right into his trap, a plastic garbage sack.  He was able to trap it inside the sack and take it outside to let it loose.  It was one of those black birds we see flying all over the place, I don't know the name of the thing, but I was not very happy to have one in my house.

I must say, Andy was even a little spooked when he was trying to catch it.  I felt better knowing I was a little bit justified in my reaction to this critter.  Now we need to find out how the heck he got himself into our vents anyway.  Jeff was just glad Andy got it out so he didn't have to do it.  A big, huge thank you goes out to our "hero" of the day.  Thank you Andy for taking an hour and a half to get the beast out of the house.  Now I get a little jumpy at any sound that slightly resembles the echo's of the bird fluttering in our ducts (i.e. the dryer or the heater kicking on).

The funniest part about it was when Ali first heard the noise, she asked if that was "our bird," thinking it was one of the many in our stove.  I said yes it was and she was so happy and said "Now we have a bird like Haley has a bird."  Hahaha, not quite, but I'll let her keep thinking that.

G - O - O - A - A - A - L - L

Is that how they say it in the pros???

Last Saturday was Ryan's last soccer game of the season.  He has been playing on this team since last spring and he has really enjoyed it.  I have been so impressed at how good he has been getting.  It sure is fun to watch your kids excel at something.  He has never been one who likes running a lot, so he has been playing defender on the team.  Coach will ask him almost every game if he wants to go in as forward, but he usually won't do it.  This last game, a few of the parents (unbeknownst to me) had pooled some money together and showed it to Ryan.  If he made a goal that money would be his.  Well, I guess they said the magic words, because in the second half, he was put in as forward and was sure working hard to get that $20.  I think it makes it a little more worth it if you know what the reward will be.  In an absolutely picture perfect drive down the field, someone passed the ball to Ryan and he made the perfect kick into the goal.  It was AWESOME!!!!  Having it be my son adds to my enthusiasm just a tad.  

I sure am proud of you, Ryan.  I love you so much and I am proud to be your mom.  I've said this before, but as long as you are doing your very best, I will be so happy with what you accomplish.  Keep up the hard work.

How many STOOGES did it take???

So, just how many "men" does it take to get this:

Out of that:

Apparently, I drastically overestimated the skills of my dear husband.

It all began just before the kids were to go out trick-or-treatin' when Jeff threw the ball to Jason across the street.  Out jumped the tree and grabbed that sucker and would not let go.  So......... darn-it......... what do we do????  Let's throw up a basketball and try to knock it out.  Well, that got stuck up there, right next to that darn football.  So, let's try a soccer ball.  Nope that didn't work either, it got stuck right there with the rest of the balls.  Now we have a dilemma, 3 balls stuck up in this incredibly tall tree, and there is not one of them who is about to climb the poor thing to get them out.  I looked out the window and see Jason with his Little Giant stretched out at full length trying to knock it out while Jeff has a rope and is trying to shake the tree, no luck.  Jeff gets our our Bacci set and tries to throw those balls up there to knock out the others.  Nope, again a couple Bacci balls got stuck.  With a rope, a ladder, a super duper long pole, Jeff, Jason, Ryan, Tyson, Malcolm, Jared, Brother Hoppe, and countless spectators who were trick-or-treatin' managed to get out all the balls from the darn tree in just under an hour. Needless to say, I have a bunch of ingenious "men" that I can count on to get any job figured out.

Love ya Dear!!!