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This is a guest post. Since we’ve had some of these come into my house already this summer, I thought it was a very timely post.

Ant Killing, Starting with the Kitchen

If you’ve got ants in your house, you need to get the problem under control quickly, before the infestation grows.

This post is dedicated to a key aspect of ant killing: checking all areas of your kitchen, including ones most people don’t think about, for ants or food particles.

If you want to know how to exterminate ants, start by understanding the places these pests tend to use as hiding spots.

There may be an area of your house you don’t realize is home to ants. Read on to make sure you’re not overlooking these vital locations.

Refrigerator

When ant killing, it’s important to look in places you wouldn’t normally consider.

Start with your refrigerator. The top of your fridge is a hotspot for ant activity. It’s warm and often dirty, so clean here often to prevent an ant infestation. If you’ve got ants here, this is a great location to put an ant trap.

Besides the top of the fridge, look under it. Thanks to spilled food and drinks, it may be the ant buffet location of your kitchen. Pop off the grate and use a flashlight to look under. If you see ants, stick a trap there. To keep ants from congregating under your fridge, keep the area clean. If you have a spill, clean it up quickly before it finds its way far under and out of your reach.

Trashcan

Your kitchen trashcan is another key spot for ant infestations. Keep the lid closed and empty it often. If food gets spilled on the inside of the trashcan, clean it out.

Cabinets

Out of sight doesn’t mean it should be out of mind. The tops of your cabinets may not get your attention often, but if you see ants in your kitchen, you should clean this area. If you see ant activity on the top of cabinets, stick some ant traps there.

Inside your cabinets is another common spot ants congregate. Check under the cabinet paper lining, which is a great place for the ants to hide. When storing food, make sure it’s in airtight containers. If there are any spills, even the smallest crumbs, clean them up.

Carefully inspect the insides of cabinets for cracks, crevices and corners that can conceal the ants.

Sink

Your sink is the perfect place for an ant infestation. They gather there to drink. If you don’t see ants on the top, check underneath your sink. If you have a leak under your sink, ants could be gathering there, using it as a waterhole. Check your pipes regularly and fix any leaks as soon as possible.

Stove

Just like the underside of your refrigerator can hide food that has spilled, so can your stove. Crumbs find refuge under the stove.

Baseboards

And when looking under your stove, take a look at your baseboards. They often have sticky food residue, which is incredibly enticing for ants.

Now that you received more information about ant killing in the kitchen, your next step should probably be learning more about how to exterminate ants in other locations of your home. Post written by guest blogger Michelle Anderson.

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Yes, you read that correctly.  I just caught these pictures on Twicpic via @ericming5 that they are bolting the windows shut in the capital building in Madison Wisconsin.

The bolt tops have been taken of make it impossible to open the windows. How is this not a fire hazard and how is this okay to treat your citizens this way?

Now, this is what I’ve gathered — they started kicking people out of the capital this afternoon saying that they had to clean (who knows if this is true or not. I’ve got people saying it was gross. I’ve got others telling me that the people were cleaning it themselves. One of the sources for that statement is the Chicago Tribune over the weekend). However, NOW they are not letting anyone back in. The ACLU is now involved. They are now seeking an injunction to permit public to freely enter Capitol. Also, Senate Org Comm is circulating ballot requiring Majority Leader’s signature on all paychecks of Sen. Dem employees. What the essentially means is that they will NOT get paid until the Democrats return.

Even though I no longer live in Wisconsin, this makes me ill. Please tell me that this is NOT how you treat Americans.

(If I hear any more about this tonight, I’ll update this post.)

PS Mainstream media – How are you NOT covering this???!!!???

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The school that Madison is going to next year collects Box Tops.  If you don’t know what Box Tops is, let me explain.  There are a ton of items that you can buy that have the image to the left on the box.  You collect these for your local schools, and they get 10 cents for every one you turn in.  Now, that doesn’t sound like a lot, but when if you can get a bunch of people together, it adds up quickly.  Now, the school’s goal is to earn $750 from Box Tops.  Last year, they made $536, and I would love for them to meet their goal for this year (even though Madison is not even enrolled yet.  I understand that any extra money to the school with benefit her).  Now, there are several ways we can do this for our local schools.

First, you need to log into the Box Tops site and create an account.  You enter your state and your school or if you don’t know that, just enter your zip code.  I personally entered the school and state.  From there, you are able to see how your local school is going.  Now, how do you increase that number?  Well, you can collect box tops with that logo on it.  They also have a Marketplace.  Now, until recently, I did not know about the Marketplace.  This works so awesome too!  There is a list of stores that will give a percentage of whatever you buy from them back to the school.  There are stores like Avon, Gap, Kohls, Best Buy, Leap Frog, Target, and Walmart (this is just a couple of them — the whole listing is on the site).  All you have to do is log into the Box Tops Site, click on marketplace, then click on the store you want to shop it.  That’s it.  Once you checkout, the percentage you purchased will then be applied to your school.  If you are Christmas shopping online anyway, why not help out your local school (and if you don’t want to help any of them out, I’ll tell you the school we are sending our money too, and you can use them).

Did you know that Box Tops has donated more than $250 million to schools nationwide since 1996?  Would you like to help raise that number?  Then start collecting Box Tops and use their Marketplace to do your online shopping!  To help you get started, I am giving away a $50 gift card to Barnes & Noble (thank you Barnes & Noble for your support of such a great program!).  What do you have to do?

Each one of these things will give you one entry:

1. Leave a comment on this post. I want to know why you want this $50 gift card to Barnes & Noble!
2. Twitter about this contest. Please leave me your username so I can verify.
3. Stumble this post. If you don’t know what Stumble Upon is, please read Lori’s post at Blogging Cents. She explains it extremely well.
4. Add this post to other social media sites like Digg, Kirtsy, Blogging Zoom, Reddit, Propeller, Etc.

For 5 additional entries,

1. Blog about this on your blog. Please give me the URL, so I can verify.
2. Add this to any forums you belong too. Please give me the URL, so I can verify.
3. Subscribe to this blog using either my email or RSS feed
4. Add my badge to your sidebar:

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This contest will end November 26th at 8:00 pm CST and is for US residents. Good Luck!

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Anyone who follows me on Twitter probably knows that my aunt has not been good for some time now.  She has lung cancer that she has been battling (she also has diabetes and has had breast cancer in the past).  My mom did see her a couple of weeks back, and she was doing really well.  Therefore, I was super surprised when I got a phone call yesterday from my sister that my aunt was in the hospital and not doing well at all.  At this point, she was being given a week, 2 tops to l live.  Well, my mom got a call this afternoon to get up there now.  So, here I sit, 4 hours away, unable to do anything, waiting.

As you can probably tell, my posts this week is probably going to be quite erratic.  I will post when I get time, but as soon as I get the call about what arrangements are made, I will be heading up to Wisconsin with the kids.  Bill will stay here and work.  Anybody on Entrecard, this holds the same.  My parents have dialup, so internet access up there sucks.  I’ll post when I can, I’ll drop when I can.

I’ll be honest — this has really put things into perspective for me.  Who cares if the basement isn’t finished?  Yes, it would be nice.  However, nobody besides me is going to care.  I was reading some of the forums I frequent this morning, and just getting horribly irritated (needless to say, I didn’t comment because I would have just come across really rude).  The things people complain about in the whole scheme of things is really dumb (and I’ll admit, I am guilty of it too).  I’m giving my kids an extra hug today whenever I can, because they are what’s important for me.

Life can be gone in an instant.  Make sure you hug your kids and tell them that you love them.  Make sure you hug your husband/wife and tell them that you love them too.  That’s what is important.

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I don’t normally write too much about celebrities on here.  However, I was interested in the Health Ledger autopsy results.  It is so sad to see someone with so much potential die young.  I watched The Patriot the other night and got all teary eyed when I saw him.

“Mr. Heath Ledger died as the result of acute intoxication by the combined effects of oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam and doxylamine,” medical examiner’s spokeswoman Ellen Borakove said in a statement.  What that means is that he died from an accidental overdose of prescription drugs that included painkillers, sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication.

He would have turned 29 on April 4.  My thoughts and prayers go out to his family and especially his little girl.

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