If your kid gets lice it doesn’t mean they have a dirty scalp and you’re a bad mom, it just means you’re unlucky and that your kid rubbed heads or shared a pillow/hair brush/hat with a lice-infested person.
If you have fruit flies hovering around in your kitchen, it doesn’t mean you’re a slob, it means that you were unlucky enough to buy a piece of fruit at the grocery store that had fruit fly eggs on it. I bet you left a peach on the counter to ripen, the eggs hatched, and suddenly you have fruit flies. And they can be tough to get rid of.
If you ever find yourself in this boat I recommend you do two things.
Get rid of the offending fruit. Stick that peach in the fridge. Throw those ripe bananas in the freezer for future smoothies. (Better yet, rinse your fruit as soon as you get home from the grocery store.)
Make a fruit fly trap. I bet you have everything you need lying around the house already. You have to start the night before.
1) Don’t drink that last mouthful of wine in your glass. Leave it. This is your fruit fly bait.*
2) Leave the glass on the kitchen counter and stumble into bed.
3) The next morning, cover the glass with a tight layer of plastic wrap.
4) Take a toothpick and make some small holes in the top of the glass. They need to be large enough for the little buggers to crawl through, but small enough for them to not be able to escape. You might need to poke and tear a little bit.
Here’s some good news: FRUIT FLIES ARE NOT SMART.
5) Leave the covered glass on counter (or near that bowl of fruit).
Do not drink the wine.
Check the glass every once in awhile to see if the flies have taken the bait. You might need to swish the glass around every once in awhile to catch the smarter ones who didn’t fall for it and are staying on dry land. Dump your wine in the sink when all of the flies have been captured and drowned.
Death by wine! What a way to go, eh? :)
Do you have your own fruit fly remedy? Do share!
*We have since discovered that cider vinegar works even better than wine!
