5 weeks plus one

 We've been holding out a little. There is a tiny void kitten who has taken up residence for a couple of weeks in the playpen in the living room. 

Meet Phoenix. She's just here to get big enough for surgery. She was very hissy for about 2 days and now she is all about people. And Buttons...

Buttons discovered she can get in and out of the playpen. The goal was to leave the door open just enough for Phoenix. Turns out that's just enough for Buttons as well.

Ambrosia and the salad kittens are doing great. We haven't seen the kittens eating yet though they have sniffed everything. They are having fun running around and jumping on each other though. 

One month old

 Time flies. They now have small litter boxes that they are using. No access to the big ones yet to avoid them eating the clumping litter (it's a thing - like kids everything goes in their mouths until they learn better). Earlier in the week the room was moved around to look like this:

On Sunday 2 kittens managed to escape that so it was rearranged again:

Ambrosia isn't really sure how she feels about loose kittens but the crate is still their safe space and they climb back in there. 

Despite looking mildly grumpy for pictures, they are very sweet and all start chirping when mom goes in with them. Next step weaning but Ambrosia will help them with that. They've sniffed canned food but weren't really interested. 

Really??

 Tried to get individual pictures of the kittens since they are now 3 weeks old. Not a lot of cooperation. 

Waldorf (male)

Cobb (male)

Caesar (male)

Caprese (female)

Panzanella (male)

No one has escaped the crate yet but they are probably pretty close. Mom needs to sweep up in there since Ambrosia kicks litter all over and also get some non clumping litter for the kittens to use at first.

Mom was gone for a couple of days and apparently Waldorf forgot who she was:

And also just a shot of Buttons marching down the hall:

Getting bigger

 Ambrosia is relaxing some sad spending more time out of the crate. She still occasionally hisses at mom but we had friends over on Saturday and she was good with them and let them handle the kittens. One of our friends suggested getting a salad bowl:

While at the dollar store mom found a clear container to use to weigh the kittens too.

We had a few nice weather days so got some open windows.

We also have 3 kittens in the living room for a few days until surgery spots open up at the shelter on Thursday. Boba and Buttons have been a little confused by them. The gray boys are Dusty and Blue, their calico sister is Sugar (the shelter sends kittens to foster already named).

One week

 Momma cat has been renamed Ambrosia. Since the kittens were born on the 15th it lead to Ceasar then salads. Mom still isn't sure a out genders (though thinking right now 4 boys and 1 girl). 

Ambrosia is being a great mom. The kittens all weighed over 230 grams each on Sunday morning. An online weight chart says 1-2 weeks is 150-250 grams. So we have some overachievers. Ambrosia is still a little weird about some things: she hissed at mom when she was cleaning the litter box and also while filling the water dish. 

A friend came over Sunday and all the kittens were loved on as well as Ambrosia (and she was fine with the kittens being handled). All but one still hiss at everything and a couple are spitters. 

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We got a few things delivered so Buttons got a new box...until Boba stole it.

Tis the season

 Mom loves the rescue where she volunteers but felt like since they have several fosters and do limited intake, she could offer our foster services to another group as well. 

Her application was accepted and guess what?

We have kittens!! Momma cat was named Socks by the lady who found her. She gave birth on Saturday to 5 kittens. 2 tabby, 2 black and white, and 1 tuxedo. No idea on genders....mom is gonna need a couple weeks on that.

Right now momma is decompressing. We have a couple of cameras set up so we can check on everyone. 

Project

 We've been seeing a couple of cats around over the last year. Mom fed a grey and white this summer but then didn't see him (or her) again. Well with the miserably cold weather here the last month, mom's been putting out food and leaving the garage door up a crack. 

Saturday morning she went down to the garage and there he was but got startled and ran. But she went out last night and he was in the hut mom bought years ago for Allie. 

He didn't leave so mom got pretty close and he even sniffed her finger. When she got home he was still in the hut and didn't seem bothered by her or the car. 

He was gone Sunday afternoon but mom set up the crate with a blanket and food and water to see if he will use that. 

Mom is going to reach out to the shelter and see if they can take him if he's friendly. If not the plan is to get him vet checked and neutered at least. 

Food puzzles

 We've mentioned it before, but Boba is pretty smart. Mom originally bought a food puzzle and Boba knows the sound it makes when it gets moved and comes running to play with it. Mom saw a different puzzle on sale at a local store and bought one to try. 

This is the original. The sliders don't take her too long to get open. There are 3 circles that have tops that curve over and those take her a little longer. 

Chanel shows up not to use the puzzle but eat what she can. 

The new puzzle is all different sliders don't it didn't take Boba too long to figure it out. 

Cleopatra showed up too see if 

there were any leftover treats. 

Mom likes having these as an option to distract Boba sometimes. Plus Boba gets excited when they come out so that's a bonus.

Do you have a food puzzle or good toy?

Banana

 Sunday morning was a bit of a catnip party:

Everyone here tends to get a little wound up about mid morning then sleep it off.

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Project garage kitty is ongoing. Mom put a camera down there but coverage seems to be hit and miss. There's a limit to where it can be placed so it doesn't catch everything. 

Mom approached him on Sunday morning. He took a little churu from her but wouldn't allow her to touch him. The plan may be to trap him for possible TNR then keep him crated for a couple of days to see how he does. 

Finally February

 We have another short term foster. Clepatra is about 3 months old and here for about 12 days on meds for a cold. She is very sweet. 

Otherwise we've had a lazy week. 

Wound up

 Hold moly the 2 youngest had a case of the wound-ups on Sunday. Back and forth and round and round.

Until the baby ran out of gas.

Geez it's cold

 OK yeah it's January and we live in the mid-west but still.

We did get some snow and mom opened the door a little to let Boba check it out. She was unimpressed. 

Tilly got some freedom this weekend. She's also on new meds since her cold wasn't clearing up. She's been on them long enough that mom isn't worried about us catching anything. 

She's a good girl and is being very polite though mom has had to kick her off the desk several times. 

New year

Mom got some gift cards for Christmas so we got some new things. 

This scratcher is next to her chair. She's hoping Buttons will use it to climb up to be on the chair but who knows. 

We also got this new farmhouse scratcher from Chewy. (We bought it - that's where it's available)

Chanel checking out construction 

It was pretty easy to put together and seems really stable. So yay!!

We do hear some bad weather is blowing through. Please be safe and check on your neighbors. If you see animals left outside, please check with you local humane society or animal control.

A favor too: Buttons is entered in a photo contest. We will be posting on social media so be sure to check our links. One vote per day. It will say you can donate for more votes but we would never ask anyone to do that. It would be nice to win to be able to give some money to rescues but also make more people aware of CH. 

2024 in review

 Another year already. Like so many years, it brings change both good and bad. 

Let's take a journey through our year:

January was up and down. We took in the car kittens and mom had an adventure. But we also lost our Ivy girl. She is still missed. 

February brought us some older orange kittens for a couple of weeks. And Boba worked harder to figure out the food puzzle.

March had a couple of birthdays. Boba turned 1 years old and Chanel turned 7 years old.

April came and mom tried to convince Boba to wear a harness and be an adventure cat. Fail - total fail. haha  No kittens yet but the weather was finally getting nice and we got to enjoy some open window time. 

May brought us kittens. They needed a little socialization but weren't with us very long. Buckeye, Phantom and Gillig were very nice kittens. 

June started with the kittens from May being adopted. Then we had more kittens - the Cinderella group: Cinderella, Bibbidi, Bobbidi and Boo.

July came and we were invaded by a pair of CH (cerebellar hypoplasia) kittens. Pumpkin came first from a lady seeking help on Facebook. Buttons came a couple of weeks later from a vet office. We also fostered a trio of older gray kittens from the shelter for a couple of weeks. The Cinderella kittens were all adopted pretty quickly. (Pumpkin and Buttons were both private fosters that mom and a friend took on)

August was when Buttons actually arrived here. The girls got along really well.

September was uneventful thankfully. The CH girls continued to grow and get stronger. The weather cooled off some so we got a few days of open windows.

October came and brought us....Pumpkin 2.0 from the shelter. He wasn't here very long and was adopted from the shelter. Pumpkin 1.0 was stuck in the foster room due to the floors but Buttons got a little more freedom once mom blocked off the stairs.

November and there was a road trip to get Pumpkin to her forever home. Her new mom has another CH cat and we get updates that they are doing great. Pumpkin did really well on the road trip and it was totally worth it. Mom also took a vacation to spend time with friends and found out about a new water fountain. Our luck isn't great but 2 months later Chanel hasn't killed it.

December and we got our last kittens of the year. Just here a couple of weeks to get over a kitten cold then back to the shelter where they were adopted within a couple of days. We got a new gate for the stairs. Because....mom decided to adopt Buttons. The girls (Daiquiri, Chanel, Goldfish and Buttons) all got their annual vet visits and were pronounced healthy. Daiquiri could stand to lose a couple of pounds but we ran her first senior blood panel and everything looked great.

 

Some final numbers: 23 fosters this year, 11 boys and 12 girls. We are just fostering with the shelter now so we see less numbers each year. And that is really OK - there are difference and mom finds this to be a more positive interaction.

Total foster numbers: we started in 8/06. 473 fosters total: 23 momma cats, 240 females, 233 males.

We wish you a very merry, safe and happy new year. We can't promise to make mom post more often but we will do what we can. HAHA Love you all and thank you for your support over the years.