Hard to believe this was just over 7 years ago. You can see more baby pictures here
Chanel had her annual vet check on Monday. She is healthy, doing well and weighs about 11 pounds.
Chanel sent her sisters Cupcake (fka Dior) a card and some treats.
Looks like Cupcake approves (and has no intention of sharing with Newton).
Happy birthday girls (and your brothers)
Mom spent this weekend out of town with her family. 4 of the 6 of them have a birthday within 12 of each other do she wrntvto celebrate.
Mom & the kid (her niece) actually share a birthday. The kid asked Mom if she wanted to get a matching tattoo. Friday night they went and did this:
Saturday was lunch and presents and pie and basketball.
We were glad she got home safe to us though. Ms Ingrid and Mr Morgan came to take care of us and they are great. But it's nice to have mom back.
It's especially gard on Boba we think. She cane after mom started working from home so she used to her being here all the time.
The baby turns one today.
Hard to believe she used to be that little.
Boba is certainly one of a kind and keeps us all on our toes. She will snuggle with mom at night. Hates to have her nails trimmed. Taught herself to play fetch. Has figured out the food puzzle. And has opinions about EVERYTHING.
Happy birthday sweet girl.
Orange kitten report: of the 7, 2 of them have been adopted. Yay!!!
Valencia is healing up well and she and Cara will likely go to the partner store this week. Mom would like her wearing the cone for a few more days.
The weather got nice on Sunday so mom cracked the windows open a little for some fresh air.
Still a little early for little kittens here but should be soon.
In the meantime, these two are enjoying the quiet.
The oranges were all spayed and neutered on Friday. Next step adoptions. We did get a couple kittens wrong: Seville is a girl and Cara is a boy so now maybe CC).
Mom broke out the food puzzle again and this time Boba figured out all the doors that were closed (2 of them).
No little kittens yet, but a woman reached out to the rescue last week and the rescue took in 7 kittens about 4 months old. The rescuer said they came from a hoarding situation with lots of cats in a mobile home. She's working with the lady but for now this crew us out and safe.
Two girls and five boys. And they all look very much alike. Mom and her friend Heather are fostering so the kittens are divided 4 with her and 3 here. They are scheduled for surgery on Friday.
The kittens are named after oranges. The three here are:
Sally was spayed on Friday and is now available for adoption and at our partner store.
Lizzie, Lightening and Mater are being spayed and neutered today and will go to the store later this week.
Friday however, we had a little excitement. Mom was working at her desk and Boba was looking under the sofa and was being growled at. A tuxedo shot out and was slinking around the room. Mom muttered for Goldfish to get over herself.
And the she looked a little closer: turns out it wasn't Goldfish. Mater had snuck out of the room and was a little freaked out by the stalking tabby cat (Boba).
A post by the mom
You were promised an adventure story - here goes:
On Saturday a post went up on Facebook about a woman in a domestic violence situation who was trying to leave but needed to know a mom and kittens were safe. If you know anything about DV situations, a lot of people won't leave because there are very few shelters that will take animals and they fear what will happen if they are left behind.
A friend asked if I could take them since I didn't have fosters at the time. While I always want to help, I do have limits and mine is there has to be some sort of rescue backup for vetting and adoption placement. That fell into place and I agreed to go pick them up and foster.
Now, here is where I will add a couple of caveats - first, we all should have asked a few more questions about "kittens" and the weather. We have gotten snow here in Ohio but it is clear where I live so I didn't really think about it. The woman did say maybe we should wait a few days, but that made me nervous. Also, this is not my first rodeo so while I agreed to go get them, I was taking someone with me.
We drove about an hour, found the turn off and realized we were driving onto a track of driveway not really a great road and there were no other tire tracks. But we had made it that far and decided to just finish up and not have to worry about trying to come back. We drove down the road, turned left onto what we thought was another drive way and ended up having to park a ways from the house since it was snow and I didn't want to risk getting stuck in their front yard.
My friend and I trekked to the house with the carriers I brought and the lady came to the door. We got 3 kittens into carriers (after realizing they were about 5 months old - so again, ask a few questions. we still would have taken them, but I would have brought bigger carriers) She had mom in a pop up crate and said we could just take that. But one kitten was loose in the house. She tried to get it and came back out and said she couldn't.
We weren't comfortable waiting around so headed back to the car. As we were loading up, she yelled she had the last one. We got that one safely in a carrier, wished her well and got in my car to head out.
We got almost back to the top of the hill when the front wheels lost traction and we started to spin. Back up and try again, to no avail. We did notice a slightly flatter line off to my left so we backed up and tried to make a run at that.
Nope - we ended up sliding sideways, perpendicular to the driveway and about a foot from a fairly large tree.
Meet Merritt - named after the towing company
We did pick up Chinese for dinner since it ended up being an entire afternoon adventure not just a couple of hours. This was one of the fortunes:
The kittens have settled in here. They are a little shy but fairly social. Mom is also social. There are 2 boys and 2 girls. Mom and the girls will be spayed on Friday, the boys neutered a little later when we can get appointments.
Either way, they are all safe and I hope the lady now feels she can get out and get somewhere safer. I don't know her circumstances and I wasn't going to ask. But I hope this little bit of kindness helped her.
There is a longer story to this that mom will tell in a couple of days, but on Saturday we got some new recruits in the foster room. They are about 5 months old and a little scared but calm and we bet they adjust in now time. Meet the cars kittens:
First, thanks for your comments about Ivy. It never is easy no matter the circumstances.
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Update: Milkshake was adopted! Single guy in an apartment. No doubt Milkshake is loving having his own person.
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We've said it before, but Boba is super smart. And has all the opinions. Mom got a food puzzle and it going to see if that will keep her busy. It won't be left out - it will come out from time to time as a "new" toy.
First try was treats with all the doors open. They figured it out pretty quickly. So next step is close one or two doors.
But her favorite game is still fetch
born 8/1/08, gotcha day 12/16/08, passed away 1/9/24
Mom got home after Christmas and Ivy had some swelling around her neck. Our vet wasn't available so to be careful, she checked in with a local urgent care vet and they did an ultrasound and diagnosed lymphoma. They did suggest a lot of things, but based on Ivy's age, mom opted to get some meds on board and take her home.
We knew it was about buying time, but it turns out we only had a couple of weeks. Ivy stopped eating and just seem tired. Mom contacted our vet and was there with her for her last breath here.
Ivy was a foster fail - she came to us with her momma and 4 sisters.
She was the grand princess here for all 15 of her years. While she never tried to bite anyone, she was happy to growl at anyone who didn't make sure they respected her boundaries. She gave mom a run for her money when she was younger but mellowed with age. Though would still growl at the vet every time.
We miss you Ivy.....
It being January in the mid west, it could be a while before we get foster kittens.
Mom is busy with work but thankfully from home so we get to see her a lot. She's also been doing some cleaning and organizing.
Mom says she doesn't have any big plans for the year yet but would like to see some of her cat lady friends she has been missing. Just have to figure that out.
We hope the best for your new year.
*a post by the mom
I try to sit down and do a year end review every year and it just didn't happen this time.
I do have some numbers:
33 total fosters this year.
18 females, 15 males.
All but 2 adopted by end of year
1 momma cat (Mochi)
1 death (Mondavi)
1 foster fail
I'm so thankful for everyone that has adopted, shared and supported this adventure.
The girls head back to the shelter today. They've turned out to ge very sweet and we suspect they will get adopted quickly. They were out starting Thursday during the day only abd were mostly good- they refused to leave mom's desk alone.
The hocus pocus girls went back to the shelter on Friday. Winifred was adopted that same day and the other 2 are still available.
Since mom was there, she of course came back with more. These tortie girls are Jupiter, Mars and Mercury. They have kitty colds so will be here for about 10 days.
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Mom also has been working on her Christmas shopping.
She ordered some cat toys from Keep Up Creations as gifts and of course some for us.
If you missed it on social media, the girls are back for a week. The shelter does a really good job trying to juggle intake, surgery dates, and adoption space. With the ringworm adding 5 weeks to their time in foster, it messed with the schedule. So to get space and also hit the outside 21 days on the ringworm test, the girls came back here.
The girls are getting some time loose in the house. First time they spent hours investigating everything.
The permanent residents are too sure, but that is typical for here.
Right now their tentative return date is Friday.
Well, some good news for the girls. No more meds for the ringworm. They are scheduled right now to go back to the shelter on Thursday for surgery. Not sure if they will go up for adoption after that or come back for final test results. But the shelter staff didn't see anything so hopefully they are clear. Turn mom will need to deep clean the room again.
This hard been kind of hard in a different way since they are friendly but couldn't be handled much for risk of spreading ringworm. Ugh
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Over the weekend mom and a friend built a nes TV stand then mom built us a new cubby/window stand. Boba and Chanel were lots of help.
The cat stand actually is now turned 90 degrees and mom left one side off the cubby. It wasn't very expensive and was pretty easy to put together.
It's been checked out and mom is pretty happy with it. She's going to buy another for a different space and they have some other very nice pieces as well (find it here)
