Mouse in the House

When Courtney came to me asking me if she could have a mouse, what else could I say, but 'No' of course. Our aim with rodents is to get them out of the house, not to bring them into it! So of course when Mum says no, where else can a daughter turn, but to her father ... to sweet talk him instead. The next thing I know Jared has already bought a mouse cage on-line (and he assures me its a really nice one - 3 storeys with pink bits on it). Meanwhile I'm saying 'hey back the truck up, I've already said she can't have a rodent', but apparently since the mouse cage had been bought, it was now too late to change any minds. Now Jared just had to go out and buy (yes, I know how wrong that sounds) a mouse ... anyway a few days later the neighbours cat catches a mouse & brings it to our house to show us, so Jared seized the opportunity & took the mouse (still alive) off the cat while Courtney runs to get the cage ... problem solved, she now has a mouse & Jared doesn't need to buy one. That idea was good for all of about 10 seconds - which was how long the mouse stayed in the cage before squeezing out between the wires. So back to square one - still have a cage & no mouse. Off Jared goes to the pet shop, where he is shown a mouse - 'no he says, its too small, I need a bigger mouse so it won't escape'. So a bigger mouse was found at the pet shop and of course one happy daughter once she saw her new pet. Me, not being a rodent kind of person, didn't take much notice of the mouse until about a week later when I happened to look in the cage & saw one very fat mouse. I was laughing so much I had to get Jared to show him how ridiculous the mouse looked - a tiny little head with this huge bulging body ... at which stage I mentioned 'better not be pregnant'... Jared instructs Courtney to cut down on the food a bit - the mouse needed to go on a diet. 2 days later Courtney proudly shows me the mouse & how much weight its managed to loose & I'm thinking, yes it does look a lot slimmer (must be all that running on the wheel that it does!!). Soon after when Courtney is cleaning out the cage I hear 'Mum, Sapphire (name of mouse) has had babies'. Ok, so it took 3 times of telling me before I believed her (I thought she was pulling my leg, just to get me to freak out). Yes, our one mouse in the house was now 10!! So despite my dislike of rodents, I couldn't miss the chance to take a few photos before Courtney sells them ... (well most of them ... apparently she is going to keep one - plus her original one, which will mean 2 rodents in the house!! uuuggh)