We live across the street from a sheep farm. We love looking out our back window and seeing the big white sheep dogs and the green pasture covered with various sizes of sheep and little baby lambs. The big red barn and the farm house with the gated entrance are like a picture out of a magazine....
What I HATE is that every time one of my doors opens, we are invaded by flies!! The kids come home from school and the doors are constantly open. In the evening when we are sitting around as a family in the front room trying to settle down by reading from The Friend and having family prayer, the kids are so distracted by all the flies that are on the ceiling. Then we have to count them which then makes me feel like my house is contaminated so we all try to swat them because they are sleeping on the ceiling none of us can reach them because they are all too high. Next thing I know we are climbing on the chairs and cupboards and chasing flies all over the place and so much for trying to settle down and go to sleep.
First thing in the morning as soon as it is light the flies are all over the kitchen eating leftovers. They seem to find any crumb or sticky spot I may have missed. Thank goodness the school serves breakfast because our kitchen is closed in the mornings due to intruders. Once the kids are off to school, I spend the rest of the morning trying to kill all the flies. Seriously, I can easily kill 25-50 flies a day. Then I have dead flies and goo all over the floors and walls so I spend the rest of the afternoon sweeping, mopping, and disinfecting the counters and walls. I seem to finish up just as the front door opens and the kids walk in from school.
As I have spent so much time lately bonding with these little creatures, I just have to say that they are probably the most inconsiderate and rude little things I can think of. I very rarely have other creatures in my house, except those pesty little plant flies, but then again, they are flies so this applies to them also. Unlike ants, who are very disciplined and organized, flies don't really seem to have any method to their existence. The buzz of a bee or wasp is a warning of danger but the buzz of a fly is just annoying. It seems like most other flying creatures try to avoid humans. Not flies. They attack you! They walk in your hair and they intentionally pester you when you are asleep. And it hurts when they BITE! I never have to clean up after any other insect but I have fly spots all over my blinds and ceiling. And if you ever need an object lesson in reproduction for your children, it's not too hard to find two flies stuck together.
I have been using towels to swat them but that doesn't work very well. It just knocks them out and then they come back to life. A magazine seems to work the best. Then I can just throw it away when I am finished that day. I don't really have that many magazines that come so I'm running out of weapons. My husband cannot understand why we do not own a fly swatter. Because they are disgusting!! They get covered in fly goo and then left on the floor and everything on the floor goes into the babies mouth or becomes a toddler toy. I told the kids I was going to hang up one of those sticky strips so it could catch all the flies before they came into the house. After discussing how this seems to be a very cruel way to kill flies, I am now searching the Internet for a more humane, yet baby safe, toddler proof way to get rid of our fly problem.
Well, thanks for reading. I'm off to do more searching.
BYE!
