Up to this point I have dismissed it all as house settling. Last time she was in California I was sitting here on my computer and my daughter's blues clues toy starting talking. You have to squeeze the paw to make it do that. Thinking the batteries might be going bad I picked it, looked at it and then put it back down. A few minutes later it did it again. Getting a little chill I put it on the top shelf, out of a child's reach. It stopped making the noise. When the wife called I was telling her about it. I thought it all silly and put it back on the low shelf and went back to talking to her. Within a few minutes it was doing it again.
Recently my daughter has seen things (she is 2, so nothing too surprising). The wife called me at work and said that she was pointing into the kitchen (I work nights) and asked 'Mommy, what's that?' and she saw what looked to be the shadow of a small kid darting away. While on the phone I heard my daughter say it, this time she was pointing into the corner of the living room. My wife thinks she saw it again last night too.
One last interesting note - about 9 months ago they were both in california visiting her folks and I took some pics in the house (I was testing my tripod and using the last of a roll of film, and I was going to send her mom the pics). I did not notice anything weird at the time but later when I took it into photoshop to sharpen for an upload I could see the outline of a kid on the bed (My house is all one floor above a store, and you can see the bedroom from the kitchen where I was taking shots, the rooms are about 20'x20' w/14' celings).
They are heading out to CA again at end of month and I will be home alone. I think I will put the toys up ;) (many other things have happend but these items stick out in my mind).
Uh - you definitely have a spirit of some sort in your house which may or may not make you seek other help with your home situation.
Hopefully, whatever it is will not bother anyone.