Lizard Lie

Yesterday we had an appraiser coming out to look at our house.
(Yes, we have taken it off the market and are refinancing)

The appraiser is coming, so of course ,we are cleaning the house. Getting everything looking as expensive and perfect as possible.

So she walks in the door and I put our dog up so he doesn't jump all over the poor woman and then as I am walking down the hall removing all the barricades (the girls' toy keyboards and our box fan) to the bedrooms (the dog is not allowed in the bedrooms because (1) they are carpet and (2) because he eats things like underwear, socks, plastic toys, and well just whatever he can swallow).

And as I come out of my Bekah's room there he is... a lizard.
He's all nice and perfectly still in the corner of our hall. Normally I would scream right now... but the appraiser is in the living room.
I'm thinking "does a lizard in the house decrease the value of a home?????"   

I try to stay calm as I ask Bekah to go get me a cup and then frantically motion for her to be quiet when she comes running up with the cup and goes "what is it? it's a lizard!" 

My momma "shhhhhhhh" finger goes to my mouth.

I stay perfectly still in the hall staring down this lizard daring him to move until the appraiser goes out the door to measure the outside of the house first. And then the chase is on. Slippery little sucker that he was I could not catch him!

I was perfectly calm at first. Ready to catch the lizard, but the more he escaped my grasp and wiggled and slithered all around the corner I had him trapped him, he just grew more and more ickkkkkkyyyyy!

He slithered into the closet and so I have to start emptying out the contents of the closet as I try to catch him. By this time I am squealing and then my husband comes over to encourage me in my catching as he cheers me on, laughing at me the whole time. So here me and my husband and both our girls are huddled up at the end of the hall with the contents of the closet scattered around chasing a lizard...

Well my husband decides to jump in due to my squealing and in his manly way of catching the thing he cuts off the poor lizard's tail... which continues to jump and flip in the middle of the hall floor and now the girls are screaming and I am screaming. "It's still moving! Why is it still moving?"

And yes this is the exact moment the appraiser walks back in needing to get the crawlspace door unlocked...

So my husband goes out to unlock the crawlspace and I am left with the lizard tail and on the search for the rest of the lizard.

The lizard that we never found.

So then comes bed time. Guess whose room is beside the lizard hunt?
Yes, Bekah's

Who askes if we caught the lizard as I am tucking her in the bed and giving her a goodnight kiss?
Yes, Bekah.

Who decides this might be a good time for what Jon Acuff called "a polite lie"?
Yes, me.

Well, it might not have been a lie...
I simply said "no I didn't catch him, he went back under the house."
He most certainly could have went back under the house... right?