The Sensual Scent of...Sour Milk

I am so sick of this smell.  Let me tell you why (even though I think it is safe to assume that no one particularly enjoys it).

Whenever there is a "mystery" smell in our house or in the van, 75% of the time it comes from this source.

A few weeks ago, I took out the double stroller that was in the van and hadn't been used for approximately 6 weeks.  Much to my dismay (and disgust), there was a  sippy cup with curdled milk in it.  Maybe that was my fault because...
1.  I had put the cup in the bottom basket of the stroller and forgotten, and
2.  I had smelled the horrible stench of probable sour milk and was too lazy to investigate to find the source. 

So thank god that my 3 year old threw a fit because she wanted to sit in that stroller (in the parking lot of the store that we were running into for no more than 10 minutes which has racks that are so annoyingly close together that I dread pushing a double Sit and Stand stroller through while getting evil eyes from other patrons with their 6 week old newborn sleeping soundly in a little travel system infant seat/stroller combo because I am crashing into most of the displays).  BUT if I hadn't given into her fit to avoid a complete failure of a shopping trip, I would have never found the cup and been able to claim victory over the horrid smell that had afflicted the van for close to 2 months. (And I also thank god for the cold weather or that smell would have been drastically more offensive).  I decided right then and there, no more milk in the van!

Then the other day we were getting ready to assemble the new bunk beds for my daughters' room.  They had a twin bed and a toddler bed.  So we had to take apart and put the two other beds in the attic for storage (since I store everything just "in case"...I might just be a hoarder).  When taking apart the twin bed, I noticed the strange, yet all to familiar smell.  Underneath the abyss that was my daughter's bed, I found another sippy cup from who the hell knows when (along with one of my shoes that I had been looking for since the summer, half a dozen legos, some barbie clothes, a naked Aladdin doll, a deck of playing cards, 7 books, and other random trash). The cup was completely empty but there was a stain on the floor under it.  I began scrubbing it (and it was a tough SOB but it all finally came up).  I also began gagging because within 1 millisecond I knew it was milk.  Now there will be no more milk in the van AND upstairs.
 
Water only.  Water can sit for months and be completely fine.  Water it is.

So you can imagine my dismay when I got into my van a day ago and smelled that freakin' smell once again.  WTF!!! Do these kids not understand when I say no more milk in the van?!! Do they want to drive me crazy? They must really get a kick out of it. 

I got out and started to look under the seats.  I could not let this go on as long as the last incident did.  I was looking in the back (because that is where the girls sit and clearly this was their doing) and I glanced up front as I was crawling out after an unsuccessful search.  Something caught my eye.  Could it be? NO!  It was a travel coffee mug from Disney World.  Sometimes I like to drink out of it and pretend I am on vacation (yes, I enjoy Disney World as much as my kids but mainly due to our evenings going "around the world" in Epcot).  I picked up the travel mug and opened it.  Immediately I realized it was the culprit.  There was what I can only imagine to be coffee creamer and a few sips of coffee left in the bottom.  Who knew that would smell as bad as sour milk?  Well now, I do...

I quietly dumped the mug and threw it into our recycling bin.

So the rule still stands...NO milk in the van or upstairs.  (We can keep the coffee incident to ourselves).