Our Newest Family Member

Yesterday, we went out to the farm to let the dogs run around in the snow. Since we don't have a fenced yard and our town has strict leash laws, I don't like to let them run around too much in our yard. They do have a tendency to try to check out the whole neighborhood.

While we were out there, we needed to make sure the barn cats had been fed. Surfer Pirate fed the kitties and whistled for his favorite kitten.

We've been told that usually the friendliest kittens don't make it through the winter on the farm, so we were already a little prepared for what we found.

The poor baby was sick, shivering and WAY too skinny!

It didn't take long to decide the baby would be coming home with us. I bundled the kitten up in my coat and we headed home.

Back in this baby's early, early kittenhood, Surfer Pirate had checked for gender and settled on Boy. But after a bath to remove the musty barn smells and renew soft fluffy kitten fur, I discovered our new little one was indeed a Girl.

She's eaten two cans of soft cat food and some dry cat food in the 24 hours or so that she's been here, had a bath (well, technically 3 baths, but I'll get to that in a minute), used her litter box, and has spent lots of time sleeping and snuggling. She's very affectionate. I love the way animals react when they know they've been rescued. We figure she wouldn't have made it through the night if we'd left her at the farm.

She's so very skinny. You can't tell with all the fur, but I could probably count her vertebrae if I wanted to. And her little shoulder blades and breast bone stick out much too far. Poor little thing.

She did have a little adventure earlier today. I took a bath, and had her in the bathroom with me because that's where the litter box is right now. She seemed very disturbed at not being able to snuggle with me and kept pacing and meowing. At one point, she was standing on the edge of the tub staring at what I THOUGHT was the doorknob on the cabinet above the tub. Before I could even react, she jumped over my head and onto the shelf above the cabinet. She landed halfway into the wicker basket that holds all my hair things (bands, barrettes, hair brush, etc). It is a rounded basket and couldn't hold her, so down she came - along with the basket and all its contents, AND my hair dryer! (Bath #2.) She scrambled out of the tub, and while I scooped all the stuff out of the water, she decided that the best place to dry herself off was in the litter box. Yeah. So, once I was done with MY bath, I had to give her ANOTHER bath to get all the wet kitty litter off her lower half. (Bath #3.) Hopefully she won't try that trick again.


Meanwhile, Pirate Baby is due in 37 days! That also means only 39 days until my mom is here!