Catching Up

Since the last time I posted it got pretty busy around here. My DD was getting herself ready to go back to school to finish her associates in general studies and at the same time start in the culinary program. Unfortunately, the "chefs" jacket and pants available at the school store are based on Men's Medium and up sizes, since interestingly, where she is female students are a much lower percentage of the class. While I am not a seamstress in any respect of the word, I am really good at pretending I am LOL! When all was said and done, the pants were shortened by 6+ inches and the medium ended up becoming a small fitted. On the first night of class the instructor used my daughter as an example of how everyone should look....bahahah...only if everyone else has a crazy crafting mother! She is so excited...so far she has won the challenges each night of class and the Chef appears to be impressed in this short span and while everyone else has been paired up with someone, she is her own group as he wants to "see what she can do". I told her I thought in a way it was a little unfair since everyone else will be able to count on someone else to help out and she said that was ok...she prefers not to have to and if she does need help, the Chef will do so. I am so happy that she is so happy!

For those who don't know, about 8 weeks ago we ended up finding a feral cat in our yard...well the truth is we didn't find her as much as DH was spraying around our tiny patio he got to the area behind out tall blackberry plants thus hitting her and she took off. My DH said OMG! there are kittens get a box quick and then that is where it all began. We brought them inside and thankfully none had been sprayed. We then pondered what to do because 1 - we didn't want a feral cat in our small patio and 2 - we didn't want a feral cat in our small patio. We called animal control who showed up and told us that if she were to take them they would be put down since it was 10:30 on a Sunday night and no one was there to take care of such young kittens (approx. 8 days since their eyes were just starting to open). She did leave us a trap to see if we could catch the mother and then she could take them all so that the mother could raise them and then when big enough they could be put out for adoption. In any case, she would come back the next day and take the kittens in since they had a list of people who foster who be be happy to in case the mom didn't come back....hmmmm ok...so we put the kittens in the back of the cage and set it outside and waited. DH went out since it was really dark and the night was cool and as he picked up the cage Mom cat who was laying "next" to it took off in the dark. Kittens were put in box with warm towels and we syringe fed them every 3 hours. The next day the officer came back and took all 3 of them and asked about the mother. We told her she had come but had not gone in. She said keep trying in the meantime she was going to get the fostering taken care of. You would think this was the end of the story but NOOOOOOO....around 3 in the afternoon I get a call from her asking if we had caught the mom. Now she knew we had told her that the cat only appeared late at night and we told her no. "Well" she says..."unless you can catch the momma by 3:30 the kittens will be put down as there are no foster parents since it is kitten season and it is FULL!!!!!!!!! What?!!

In the meantime, DH who "hates" cats is seeing me get upset and tells me that he's sure we can do it but that we could not keep them. I told the officer to let me foster them and she said she would check and call me back. I immediately called a good friend who lives on a farm with feral cats (all trapped and fixed) and asked her if she could take 3 in case we couldn't trap the mom and actually ended up having to foster them. After hearing the story she said absolutely so now it was a wait and see. I got the return call from the officer who told me I could not foster the kittens since I was not "licensed or approved" but that she could make it a return to owner if I got to animal control in the next 10 minutes before they closed! Talk about taking it to the wire!

So we run down, they give me formula and instructions on how to foster kittens and at the same time explain that if we can't catch the Momma then we will need to help the kittens to go to the bathroom since they don't know how to do it on their own. So for us it is important to trap the momma! "Use just 1 of the kittens as bait and you'll be fine". So there we are back at home. Syringe feeding these kittens (who by the way hate it all the way!) and get the trap ready!

Night comes and I put the largest kitten in the trap and wait. All of a sudden we see the momma appear. She circles the crate mewing...the baby is mewling back and scooting towards the front of the crate...Momma walks in picks up the kitten and takes off over the fence....WHAAAAAAATT!!! DH is like great now what do we do as we are looking at the other 2 kittens left in the box. Decision time....try to foster 2 kittens, one of which is the runt and not looking too good, or try to catch the Mom again and if we do then we know the 2 will survive but we will never be able to find the one she took off with. For the good of 2 we chose this path. This time I put the little guy in the back but as he moved only a little we knew the Momma would have to go all the way into the crate. We set it out again and sure enough she came back 1/2 hour later and we watched her walk into the crate grab the kitten and on the way out set the trap off so it pushed her out of the trap with a good slam on her bottom.

"That's it!" we took the last kitten out in a low box on a towel and waited for the Momma to return but she never did. I think the smack really scared her because she has never come back for the 3rd kitten at all. Sooooooooooo, this is the little one we ended up fostering just one kitten who we named Guiness (Cause he is tan with what we thought were black eyes....get it a Black and Tan...guiness beer LOL!)





And since the first thing shim (she he we still can't tell) is the dogs....Guiness thinks he is one too! Time has flown and Guiness who started out just under 8 oz. is now a little over 2 pounds! He is growing up fast and my DH who could originally fit him in his pocket and always said that he "hates cats" can always be found with Guiness on his lap petting him and talking to him....he says it's because he is vested in the cat...after all he came home every day to bottle feed him and watch the "tour de france" with him at lunch. I just think you can teach an "old dog a new trick!" LOL. Plus the dogs have been around him and to them he is just another one. Here they are finally calmed down and together:

Tomorrow I will be sharing the new files that I have or will be putting up in the store along with a limited time freebie...so make sure you come back to check it out! In the meantime, I want to share a short video of 2 of my dogs playing with each other. Enjoy!