The missing key is the most unsettling thing so far!

The missing key would really freak me out too. I definitely would get outside cameras AND change the locks. Creepy.

While an animal could have done it all, I'd not want to take a chance it's something else entirely.

Well, maybe it really is haunted and they're just sick of you being home all the time during the pandemic!

We will definitely be tightening security around here. Unfortunately DH thinks I'm overreacting, but I think this key thing is starting to bother him. I've contacted everyone who ever knew about the key and none of them say they ever touched it. Yet it's gone.

Could the key have been blown away with a leaf blower? Just a thought...or maybe a pressure washer?

Thanks, but no, it wasn't in such a position to be affected that way.

Beautiful walk way. I agree that the locks need changed and a camera put up. I didn't like the sounds of things when you mentioned it the other day, and found the ring. Now I really don't like it. Please be very careful, and vigilant.

The rock looks heavy enough that it wouldn't be moved that far, accidently, by an animal.

I agree, locksmith and camera.

Good news! DH found the key! Yay!

No locksmith needed. Yay!

Now we just have to deal with the more supernatural. Phew!

Oh thank heavens the key has been found. I didn't comment earlier because I found this really unsettling and I didn't want to add to your worries. But I feel so much better now - yep, you're right - now only the supernatural enigmas are left.

Are there bears in your area? At our PA place we often see them sauntering through our property lifting up rocks or tearing the woodpile apart while looking for edibles. They are very curious creatures and have knocked over landscape lights and left their claw marks on door frames.

We have them here in NJ too - I just haven't seen one.

I'm glad the key has been found! I still think you need a security camera of some kind, though.

Did he find it where he had put it and did he admit it??? I have looked for various things through out my life only to find them in plain sight and where I and others would swear they had looked. Like the top of the table where they were normally kept.

whew...glad about the key. Keep us informed.

That's a relief!

Thankful you found the key! That must be a great relief and I hope you get to the bottom of the other little surprises. A game camera is really an inexpensive and easy way to watch what goes on. We do have an outside security system now, but still use our game cam for more remote areas where we capture the wildlife.

Yes we have bear but I've not seen one...I think we had 80 sightings in our town last year. It's because of them that I get rid of the bird feeders in the spring and don't put them up again until it gets cold in the fall.

I need to update as we've had another weird happening.

I woke up this a.m. and sitting on the kitchen island was a clorox wipe. It wasn't there when I went to bed last night. DH said he didn't get up in the night and use one. If it were the cats finding one and playing with it, well, a) they don't belong on counters and they know it, and b) it was still wet!! If they'd found it somewhere and played with it, it'd be dry by now.

Oh and the alarm was set so no humans entered during the night.

Where's Rod Serling when you need him???

Very weird. Where was the wipes container? Did you ever change the locks, even though your DH found the key? I really hope so.

You need to move. I hear Mtn's house will be available soon.

Now you need a camera in the HOUSE!!!

Well, if you have a ghost, she is a very tidy one. 😁

My thought about the key was that someone may have taken it, made a copy and put back the orginal.

I have the same question as Tami. Where is the container for the wipes? Is it open? Could the cat(s) have gotten into it in the early morning and that's why it's wasn't dry when you found it?

It sounds like a gentle haunting......☺

I'm thinking the house is telling me it's time to clean it!!!

The wipes are kept in a container under the sink in the island. I use them infrequently in the house as I prefer to use the spray and the paper towel given how spotty finding the wipes can be.

But the fact that it was wet...I mean really wet like it just came out of the container...so odd.

No we didn't get new keys made but it wouldn't matter as, even if the door is opened with a key, the alarm would sound as the door is opened...and that certainly would've woken me up, so if it's human, then one of us is sleep walking....

We have a lot of old stone walls & periodically we find some knocked down. Size only a bear could knock off.

There is another possibility. Someone in the house is sleepwalking. I would suggest a couple of cameras inside with one facing the area of the bedrooms. My brother did this. Found out when he wanted to be woken at a certain time. He got up by himself. Came to the kitchen, ate and drank his normal breakfast. Then he spilled a hot cup of coffee on his lap. Went to change then hours later came out growling at us because we did not wake him. Also complaining that he had a red sore area on his leg. He did not remember being up earlier and yes during the time he was in the kitchen his eyes were open.

The container of wipes, was it where and how you left it? DH and I leave the wipes in the container differently: either pulled through the slot and ready to go, or slipped down inside. How were yours left?

We had a key hidden in the crook of a tree and we put leaves on it, visible for me see from my bay window. I glance up from my book one day and see a squirrel climb into the key zone, sure enough, he had it in his mouth and took off.

Oh dear Yayagal!!

That ring has spooked you.

Ring. small animals will haul things around. Racoons will haul stuff around. My cats will carry things they find around. I once had a cat that would carry pencils by the pointy tip. For fun apparently. I dont know what sort of birds you have but many of them hoard and that ring would be prime. Pack rats hoard. It is endless.

Rock. It is round and some varmint or other must have knocked it loose and it rolled. it wouldn't take that much to make it roll. Nice rock.

Plenty of explanations though a ghost is still a possibility. I had an old house with a tornado shelter under the back floor. it was a damp clay pit sort of place. I found a tiny china scotty dog ornament on the steps so I took it up and set it up on a large high revolving cabinet that I had. It went missing. The next time I looked in the cellar hole there it was sitting on the step. That happened twice so I left it there.

I don't think anything supernatural exists other than in stories or the imaginations of people.

The simplest explanations usually answer questions. If there is something unexpectedly found on a counter, someone left it there and doesn't remember doing so. If your curiosity remains, get a digital cameras that has a motion detection function. Wyze makes good ones and there are others. They're not expensive.

It’s a lot more fun to talk about spooky stuff with your friends. Like going to haunted houses, you know it’s fake . . . Or is it? Lol.

And talking it out, flexing the mind with ALL the possibilities, even if they are impossible, helps bring the truth to the top.

bpath I think it depends on the haunted house. The Jaycees here before I joined had one at Gillis House and several when it was mentioned had odd looks on their faces. You can look up the history yourself.

Well, we wait on our cats on auto-pilot. If you are half asleep you probably would not remember that, yet again, you are waiting on a Monsieur Meow. 😁

Yaya, that is hilarious in a way, but must have been frustrating to watch.

I am guessing someone was sleepwalking in the kitchen too. :-) Your house is not haunted for sure. The rock might be moved by animals if it's light enough for raccoons or groundhogs....it's a good idea to install a few security cameras on the property. We are part-time country folks, have a weekend place in the country. For a while there was no one lived there during the week, we noticed (from security cameras) a few people drove in, looped around on our private circular driveway checking out the family compound. We had to put up a security camera warning sign by the entrance to stop strangers from going into the property.

I have no warning sign at the top of my drive but their are cameras. I get turn around people and a few who boldly drive right up to the house. When caught they pretend they thought it was a roadway.

Maifleur, I googled haunted Gillis house and a couple came up. What state are you in?

Outside, actually I thought it was funny. It's in a squirrel's nature to hoard so I got another key. lol

We used to have a key hidden outside. Friends were coming to use the lake house, so we told them where it was. All fine and dandy, but wasps had built a nest in with it! We had to call a friend with a key to go over and unlock the house!

Hahah Kathyg....we've been using our cars so little with covid that DH went to fill up the truck and found a wasp nest under the filler lid!

Elmer, I do actually believe in the supernatural. It's no different then when ancient man would think fire was magical. For me it's just science we don't understand yet....such as quantum entanglement ... or what Einstein called "spooky action at a distance." Just because we don't understand it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

" For me it's just science we don't understand yet....such as quantum
entanglement ... or what Einstein called "spooky action at a distance."
Just because we don't understand it doesn't mean it doesn't exist."

I think you have it backward.

Until something can be demonstrated and reproduced "to be", or to be shown that something "is" or "does", the default is that "it isn't" and "it doesn't".

A hypothesis or theory is false and non-existent until proven. It's not that it's assumed to be true until disproven.

Put into something more familiar - the theory of evolution of species is accepted today because of the evidence and investigations that have proven and substantiated the hypothesis conclusively. It wasn't the case that the theory was suggested and viewed as being "true" until it was disproven. That would be backward. If someone wants to disbelieve evolution as a matter of faith, that's a belief that contradicts the science. As would be believing in supernatural phenomenon - its existence hasn't been demonstrated so that the default is that its existence is unproven and assumed to not exist.

Well Annie, glad you figured that out because I was about to call in the TEAM.

https://youtu.be/cU4qbnNmxWA

One of the houses on my son's street this Halloween.

Yes Elmer, I understand that the scientific process...that you start with the null hypothesis. However, the hypothesis or even the reason to investigate something comes from somewhere. It comes from an experience or an observation for which there is no known answer.

For example, no one investigated lightning sprites until they were observed ....no one had ever even hypothesized their existence because it was completely unknown. Once observed, it triggered hypotheses which could then be tested using the scientific method for explanations and useful information.

Mankind observed the movement of the sun for millennia before there was a scientific explanation. Sure many peoples came up with a wide variety of magical explanations for it, none of them scientific or fact-based. It was the scientific method that yielded more useful information about it. But that doesn't mean the sun's movement across the sky wasn't observed or experienced and it was that which triggered further explanation through the scientific process.

LOL it's broad daylight, of course I don't believe in ghosts! Wait until dark to ask ... Annie, I'm glad your mystery has been solved; it's good to feel 100% perfectly safe in your own home.

Annie, I agree with putting security cameras around your property. It is such great piece of mind.

We get alerts when the camera spots people. We also have Nest doorbell.