Mighty Menacing Mouse

Unfortunately, I have had my fair share of run-ins with mice. My childhood home was located in the country, surrounded by farm fields. Mice were bound to be there. I can remember listening to them run across the drop ceiling in the family room of our basement. Shudder. I've seen numerous dead mice on the sticky traps that my dad used to lay around the house. Skin crawling. One day, as I was running downstairs to grab something, I didn't turn on the lights and step on one of those traps. With a dead mouse on it. Gagging. I guess the silver lining to that story was that I was wearing shoes.  Peeling that thing off my shoe was not the most fun I've ever had. When Dan and I were living with my Dad a few months before moving to our Vicar mansion in the sky, (that's a whole other story- it was an old funeral home) I was sorting through some boxes of my mom's old clothes. While digging through a box of old t-shirts, I noticed a slight smell. The deeper I dug, the stronger the smell. To my absolute horror and disgust, I found a handful of dead, decaying baby mice about 3/4 of the way down. Dry heaving. Apparently, some momma mouse thought that a pile of t-shirts was the perfect place to nest and have her babies. I'm guessing that she later got caught in one of those sticky traps and never returned while her babies starved to death. Needless to say, everything in that box was thrown away. 

In college, my Senior year, I lived with six of my best friends in an upper apartment of an old house. The house itself was in pretty bad shape, but we didn't care... we were poor college student, just happy to be living off campus. We had seen a few mice here or there and could sometimes hear them squeaking in the walls. Dan and another friend once tried to catch one with an empty beer box and oven mitt. They were unsuccessful, but provided some good entertainment. One of my room mates made a gross discovery one day. A mouse had eaten itself to death in her bag of Sunchips. Ounce again, if you want to see the silver lining to that story, at least she had taken a peek inside the bag before she stuck her hand in. Gagging again. We also had them in the apartment I lived my 5th year in college. 

Mice seem to follow me. I don't remember seeing them in the funeral home, but I'm sure they were there. I even had one in my "luxury" apartment when I was teaching in Ohio. We've had them here in Missouri, every winter since we've moved down. Usually, it's one or two and I can set a trap (always the ones where you can't see them) and that's that. During a visit, my Dad found a dead one in our guest room closet in the basement. It had smelled suspicious, so I had him check it out, so I wouldn't have to see or touch it. 

However.

I cannot catch the recent mouse/mice that have been coming into our house. I've caught two already this winter, but this third one (I pray it's just one) will not take the bait! And it's a nasty little critter, chewing on things that aren't food and leaving poop everywhere! Gross, I know.

Mice like bananas. Did you know that? Where am I supposed to keep my fruit?

The also like rubber. This is the handle of our cheese slicer.

The most recent victim was one of Molly's clean bibs. 

It was in this drawer of towels. I don't get it. 

I have two of these traps out, in different spots, baited with peanut butter and jelly, and chocolate and cheese. 

 

This mouse doesn't care. Just walks right by it, leaving a trail of turds. 

Anyone have any tips on getting rid of this critter? I'm hesitant to try the poison pellets because I don't want it going off somewhere in my house to die and decay. Been there, done that. Plus, I'm not to keen on having poison laying around with two young children. 

HELP!