Ants in the house

I'm usually overrun with ants, but have had nothing since i put down a Nippon ant thingy.
They take it back to their nests, apparently, and it works from the source.

No ants so far, that is.

I put out fly papers one year, when I still had a conservatory and quite by chance left one flat on the sill, by the door. The next day I found loads of ants stuck to it. I felt rather bad about it. I didn't get any more ants after that.

I get some in the kitchen each year. They come in round the kitchen window. I put cotton wool balls soaked in peppermint oil on the window sill and also some garlic which they don’t like. Worry a bit about the peppermint as the smell is supposed to be dangerous to dogs but the dog is ok and they seem to have stopped coming in.