Back off, you buggers!

"EEEW! Mom! There are ants on the syrup!"

These are the words that snapped me out of my early-morning fog this morning.

Oh come on. How bad could it be? I'm a farm girl. A couple of ants, especially the teeny-tiny ones we have around here, wouldn't hurt anything.

"They're all over! Yuck!" All over? Really? I made her count. There were only three.

"Just wipe off the syrup bottle. It'll be fine." Great mom, huh?

But suddenly something like a lightbulb went off in my head. Ants. On the syrup. Where was the syrup? In the pantry. Oh my gosh!!! . . .

I jumped to my feet and ran to the pantry to look for more of the little critters. I didn't have to look far as I scanned the shelves . . . sure enough, the ants had invaded.

Four years ago we remodeled our house and added my dream pantry. I absolutely love this little room because it holds plenty of food and several pieces of equipment that I don't use all that often. There is also room for paper goods, plastic cutlery, baskets--everything I need for entertaining.

But now my dream pantry also held ants. Yuck.

And I knew that if I didn't move quickly, there would be a veritable army of those buggers running up and down the walls of my pantry by the afternoon.

So this morning, at 7:15 a.m., I started doing battle with the ants.

Now, I figure that my sweet and supportive readers will love me no matter what my pantry looks like, and since I've already shown you the terrible state of my refrigerator, I've got nothing to lose. Right?

So, hang on, it's true confessions time: it's been a while since I've cleaned my pantry. I really, really needed to clean my pantry.

See?

I guess it took an army of ants to get me moving, and I have to say I'm glad they did.

An hour and a half later, every can, bottle, and box of cereal had been moved, and every shelf and baseboard had been scrubbed. Now I have a clean and organized pantry once again.

See?