SQUIRRELS. Are Pesky.

Helllloooo!
I hope everyone had a delicious, thankful, and pleasant Thanksgiving!
Steve and I are getting settled into our place! We found a nice house with 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, all hardwood floors, fresh paint, and a garage that fits both of our vehicles. We moved in on Thursday, November 19, so we've been here just over a week now. So far things have been coming together nicely. We had to get just about everything that anyone would need to furnish a home and was just starting out. We literally had Steve's TV, my bed, our clothes, and minimal kitchen "furnishings," (I guess you would call them...). So needless to say we had a bit of shopping to do. Woe is me. Hehehe.
We've since purchased a washer and dryer, a dining room table and chairs, a dresser, a TV stand, a desk, and we are waiting for our new couch to be delivered today!

Here is Steve admiring our new "espresso" counter-height table and chairs. My favorite part about our table is that the leaf to expand it is stored under the table top and comes out butterfly-style when you need it! How cool is that?

Here is the first meal that we ate at our new table. I made tilapia, rice, and butter beans.

Steve and I had read about butter beans before we moved to Alabama. We found some at the grocery store and wondered what all the hoop-lah was about.

Me, about to try butter beans for the first time. Are they any good?

Yes, they are!

They are an earthy-tasting bean with a very potato-like texture on the inside. The inside is even white like potatoes, like butter beans were actually potatoes in disguise. Or something. And, (amazingly!) they taste fantastic with butter on them.

Our table was delivered the day before Thanksgiving, and thank goodness because I decided 2 days before thanksgiving that "darn it, I want Thanksgiving dinner." So yes, I cooked a full-blown all-out Thanksgiving dinner for Steve and I that probably could have fed a family of at least 8. But it turned out well. And we still have about a half ton of leftovers to eat. I made my mom's cranberry relish, a pecan pie, a 12 lb turkey, a box of stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, veggies, rolls, and gravy! Yum yum. I was going to make a pumpkin pie too but ended up buying a pre-made one due to the "shortage" of canned pumpkin this year. :-(

Here is what our Thanksgiving spread looked like. Lovely on our new table!

Here's is my turkey! It was yum-yummy. :-)

So I'm sure, at this point you're wondering, so what does all this have to do with pesky woodland creatures? Well I'll tell you. Come to find out, it's nesting season for flying squirrels, and around this time of year many people have problems with them invading their attic. Oh yes, we definetly have squirrels, but they aren't in the attic. They decided to chew a hole in the side of the house and are now living in the wall in our bedroom RIGHT next to the head of our bed. SQUIRRELS ARE NOT QUIET! And become particularly ACTIVE at DAWN. We notified our landlord who had humane traps set out a few days ago, but the squirrels have proved to be smarter than we thought. :-(

Steve and I were listening to the chewing and scratching at dawn this morning, making sure to give the squirrels a few good bumps on our bedroom wall as a thanks for waking us up at dawn again. And then, Steve was listening to the wall and said "I think it's right here. And when he touched the wall, it broke! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! The squirrels had not only been chewing on the framework inside the wall, but also on the wall it self. To make matters more interesting, the squirrel was right inside the hole!!! So at dawn this morning, Steve and I are stumbling around the house in the half-darkness looking for something to put in front on the hole until we could call our landlord to have something done about it. "Put this cardboard and some packing tape!" "No the tape will take the paint off the wall." "There's a HOLE in the wall!"

There is now a board and a heavy box in front of the hole, because a squirrel has already stuck a nose, a bushy tail, and one teeny tiny paw through the hole into our bedroom. (We're convinced it's a squirrel-monster and it's trying to get us!!)

SEEEEE?!?!? Squirrel-monster!

I checked on the hole earlier and they (we think there are 2, actually) are having a grand old time making the hole in our wall bigger. It's all very interesting, LOL.
I shall continue to provide breaking coverage on this squirrel story as it develops.
<3 Hilabee