This summer has been hard

This has been a hard summer so far. I went upstairs to the attic one night and heard noises in the attic ceiling. Oreo was going crazy sniffing and the noise kept moving when Oreo moved. Of course I panicked and called my husband Don. The next day we had an exterminator come out, thinking that it was a squirrel or mouse. Nope....it was a raccoon in the attic ceiling!!! We've been here for 21 yrs and never had anything like this happen. Now, Don and I knew nothing about raccoons....not anymore lol
Upon further examination we found that it entered through the attic fan. It ripped off the cover and bent the blades up and went right in!!

We contacted a raccoon guy to come and trap him. He set this trap over the attic fan. I side for going in and for coming out. It took 5 days to catch him. 

Before we caught him, we weren't sure if it was a girl or boy. If a girl then she probably has babies. Now boys hang in packs of 2-3 or so. They are bachelors so sometimes they each have their own place to stay and sometimes they all sleep over together!! Sounds fun huh?? Yah!! lol
Well......Its a boy!!!

I've never seen a raccoon up close. He has these long strong hands. He was just like teenager not full grown. He was pretty smelly.

We kept the traps up another 5 days and didn't catch any others. We did have to buy some heavy duty cage things to keep over the attic fan until cleanup so that no other raccoons would get in.  We also got 4 cage covers to cover the air vents that are in the roof. Since the raccoon ripped off the cover we had to get a roofer to come and tarp the metal cage so that we don't get water in the attic.

We then contacted someone to come and clean everything out. On a scale of 1-10 it was a 8. They said just touching a dropping could give you disease  that wouldn't end well for you. We knew that he was on the flat part of the ceiling

and down this big slanted wall.

They were all suited up in white outfits, covering boots, heads, hands and had breathing masks on. I wouldn't so that job for anything!!!

The had to clean up the droppings, major deodorize, put in a new attic fan with a cover, replace all the insulation  in the attic, put up new drywall, tape and mud and texture the whole attic. What a mess. We contacted insurance and it wont cover any of it so we are in it on our own!!!
I am like...WHY am I paying you money for nothing???? Ha!

We have these more slants on the other side of the room. We didn't know if he had been there or not so we had to open up this slant and lucky enough he wasn't able to get in there so we dodged a bullet there and they sealed it back up again.

The attic is all textured now so tomorrow the carpet cleaner is coming to work on the carpet. We wanted to get new but its about 2,300.00 and so we are at plan B.
Sunday we are having a family painting and move everything back up there again party. The kids want to help so am I gonna say No? nope!! lol

So I will have new pics to show you next week. All the stuff we bought down is in a spare bedroom and I didn't realize how much junk that I had collected!! So this is a good time to donate and get rid of and simplify.
Only the NEEDED stuff is going back up.
This whole process has been long, frustrating at times and very costly. We will just be glad when its all over and put back together. My daughter is coming from Texas next Saturday...No pressure....No pressure lol