2022 in review

 January started off with Mike available for adoption, Chickpea still breathing weird and Thad and Titus here to friendly up before getting neutered and adopted.

February brought a notice of big changes. Despite leaving the rescue, Mike and Chickpea stayed with us. 

March sucked. Baloo left us after a valiant fight with FIP. 

April brought us the discovery that Chickpea had a sizeable polyp at the back of her throat. Surgery was done, she was SO much better and went to the Petsmart store and quickly adopted. Mom got a little geeky about colors of torbies. And we got a set of 4 boys to foster from the shelter where mom has volunteered for a while. Mike had an adventure at the local park as well. 

May had us letting the tuxedo boys meeting Mike and moving into the foster room with her since some cat (most likely Daiquiri) breaking a tespo panel. Mike was fine with the kittens and they quickly figured her out as well. The boys went back to the shelter for neuter and were quickly adopted. We then got a group of kittens from the rescue (different group) and they were named after cities in Arizona. Mom also traveled to visit family and celebrate the kid graduating from high school.

June found the Arizona kittens escaping from the panels in the foster room and Mike making all the noises about her discontent. Fortunately she got over is quickly and they all made friends. And then of course they escaped the foster room. Haha

July had Mike getting professional pictures taken and attending an adoption event at a yoga studio. We also added fosters Laredo, Garibaldi and Harvey who all showed up at the pet store during an adoption event. 

August was exciting for adoptions. The Arizona kittens were quickly adopted. A tuxedo girl named Blueberry joined us for a break from the store and Harvey went there to be adopted. So we had Mike, Laredo and a friend for him to play with and Garibaldi and Blueberry. Mike turned a year old. Hard to believe. And after going back to the store, Garibaldi and Blueberry were adopted.

September brought more change. The small rescue mom started with in the spring decided they should part ways. Mike never was part of the rescue officially so she stayed with us. The foster room got a redo and deep clean with a floor cover and new cabinets. But the shelter is keeping us supplied in kittens and we took a group of girls from them. The nice part with the shelter is they have a building and vet on site. But we don't get to name our own kittens. Dang it. haha

October brought fosters Ash (an older juvenile on meds for a cold) and Tiffany, Sam and Norman after that who needed time to get older and ready for surgery. Those there were kind of a hot mess but thankfully the cute made up for it. 

And......MIKE GOT ADOPTED!!!! We get occasional updates and she is doing great with her new mom and dad.

November was mostly dealing with snot and medicating the littles. They were super sweet and easy so that was great. They did go back and were adopted pretty quickly.

December just had one foster named Novella who just needed a couple of weeks on medication for a cold and then she went back and was adopted the same night. 

With all the changes it was a slightly slower year of fostering: we have 27 kittens total, 9 girls, 18 boys.  For total reference, we have been fostering for 16 years. 417 cats and kittens total. Pretty amazing. (210 female (22 momma cats)/207 male)

We hope you had a safe and healthy 2022. We know there have been some losses in our cat blogger family. It is never easy and we wish you all lots of purrs. We wish you a joyous and happy 2023. 

We haven't done a great job of blogging on a regular basis and hope to get more on a regular schedule. Love and purrs to all of you.

Shes ridiculous

 Novella update: she was adopted last week on the same night she went back to the shelter.

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We know cats are mostly liquid but mom wonders how most of this can be comfortable.

Novella and the box

 We got food delivered the other day and Novella discovered the box before it went out for recycling. 

She climbed in and of course the box started to move. 

Don't mind her graceless exit off the box. She stuck the landing. 

Novella is back at the shelter to find her forever family for Christmas. The last couple of days here she actually started getting up on mom's lap all on her own. This was a big deal. She would cuddle once she was caught but mom eould have to go get her.

Good luck sweet girl. It has been a pleasure to have you here as a foster.

Short term boarder

 Novella is here from the shelter for a couple of weeks while she gets over a kitty cold.

She is about 4 months old, medium hair tortie. She is a little hand shy so mom cant always catch her first try. But once she settles in, she wants all the love and purrs so sweetly. 

A new thing

 First, if you missed it on Instagram or Facebook, the kittens were all adopted over the weekend!! Yay

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Mom saw an ad for a cat tree from a seller on Etsy (https://www.etsy.com/shop/WelterWallArtDecor) and was interested. We have a landing at the mid point of our entry way stairs and she thought it would be interesting to put it there. Plus it was on sale. 

Ivy was the package inspector

It came from Turkey and was well packed

Ok that's a lot of parts

Halfway there

And only one screw up so far

It came with picture directions. They were 95% helpful. Probably could have had a little more detail but not bad.

Two shelves have a rope wrap

Finished

Unimpressed

Notice it is in the living room not on the landing. Mom thinks it is pretty so she left it here. And of course it on over 48 hours, no cat has touched it. 

Took her about 90 minutes to get it together which isn't bad. Shes going to move it around and see how it fits. It does have metal plates so when it is put in a corner it can be screwed to a wall for safety. Since this isn't a corner and may not be the final location, mom didn't screw it to the wall. 

The fuzzy bed

 A while ago mom bought a fuzzy bed for Mike. Turns out once again mom didn't read close enough and it was WAY too small. It has been in the living room and Tiffany discovered it over the weekend.

Sam and Birman are doing well too. Everyone goes back to the shelter for spay/neuter on Wednesday and we bet they get adopted asap on Friday. 

Norman selfies

 Never trust a kitten with your phone

Weekend report

 Holy cats it got cold and fast. We even hate how on Saturday. It didn't stick but we got to watch it come down.

Since mom didn't have plans she decided to let the kittens loose during the day. We are lucky this shelter is ok with letting our kittens out with the permanent residents. Ivy and Daiquiri were not convinced this was a good idea.

The kittens ran around like lunatics for the first coupke of hours but settled once they got it out of their system. 

Then they found comfy (mostly) spots and took naps. 

They are in the foster room at night so the adults get some peace and mom can sleep. Norman has been whacked a couple of times by Daiquiri bit he's learning to give her some space. 

Someone found the basket

 Mom looked in this morning and saw this:

Not sure if she just like the new spot or more tgat her brothers can't figure out how to get up that far. She has been using it to nap and get a better view of the birds outside.

Nice weekend

 Mom had no plans and the weather here was fabulous. Open windows for 3 days. Woohoo

The kittens will be staying for about 3 weeks or so. They have an upper respiratory infection that just won't go away. Mom did find out they were part of a litter of 9 kittens plus mom that all came in sick. The kittend were broken into groups so not to overwhelm one foster home. 

They've all gotten super friendly but have hit the "no time to snuggle things to do" age.  Plus mom had to rig a cover on the airlock to baby jail since someone escaped the other day:

In the meantime it's pretty much business as usual here. Thankfully the kittens are good about taking their meds so that helps.

The basket

 Mom went shopping at Aldi's earlier this week and found this cute basket.

The plan was to use it to store some blankets in the foster room. Cute blankets in there to open up some space in the cabinet for other things.

Of course before mom got that organized, a certain tuxedo cat found it and moved in.

Sorry Chanel. You are cute but it goes in the foster room.

Of course mom went back last night....

And they were gone.

Exciting Mike news

 MIKE HAS BEEN ADOPTED!!!!

A nice young couple saw her online and cane to meet her. Of course they were totally charmed by her and once they settled in their new place, mom and Miss Heather delivered Mike to get new home. All one level and small enough to give her space to explore but not get into trouble. 

Mike is truly the example of never giving up. Mom knew there was a family out there that was a fit for Mike. And it may have taken a while, but it happened. Mom and Miss Heather are sad she isn't here but so excited she has her own family. 

Congrats Mike and your new mom and dad!!