Potty Trained????

No Such Luck!!!

                            No, Grace just loves to watch the water spin and spin and then go down.

Every time I go to the bathroom I am followed in by my sweet little Gracie. She patiently waits for me to finish then she hops up on the toilet seat to watch the water spin and go down. Thank God she has never fallen in. Well curious as cats are... she began to wonder why the fun of the spinning had to stop so she trys to make it spin again by putting her paw into the water (thank God it is the clean water). She then figures out that she really does not like to have the water on her paw so she flicks her paw getting water everwhere. Having 7 cats I was very thankful that only one had aquire such a habit.

                                    WRONG AGAIN!!! Bigs just has to have a paw in everything....
                                                          Ya Gotta Love em!!! And I Do!!!

Light at the end of the tunnel.

We have had a very yuckie Kitty Bug going thru out house for the last few months. Yes months. I hate to put the blame on any one kitty (I love them none the less) but... we believe Sadie brought it in the house. First because she was the first to be sick with a VERY high fever and her third eyelid was showing. The showing of the third eyelid makes me so sad, it is not pretty to look at.

In this picture it is pretty mild, at times that white cover would cover 1/2 of her eye.  Milo and Bigs got a touch of it but Simon was the next to get it and he got hit pretty hard by it. The third eye lid, fever, and diarriah, lots of it. We took Simon to the vet and had a DNA test done to find out what it was. Well it had a long name that I can barley say much less spell. Anyway know knowing what it is we were able to research it. It is aquired by a cat drinking dirty water (or eating somthing with the bacteria in it). Sadie came from a colony so likley she was drinking dirty water and eating God knows what. And it matches with all of our babies symtoms and then some. No way to treat it just support the symptoms. It is also long lasting with intermitent reoccurance. So Simon begins to show improvement. Then my Tigger gets it... this is not good because to say that Tigger is not a good vet kitty is an understatement.  Tigger went to the vet a few months ago for a regular check up. He was hissing and growling and swatting at the techs. He pooped himself... finally my vet looks at me and says the only way to get a really good exam on him would be to sedate him. They can do a light sedation and then do a reversal so that he can go home with me, so I agree. They get him sedated and bring him back in the room put him on the exam table and start checking him over. Next thing we know we hear him growling and hissing, UNDER SEDATION!!! then the little turkey swipes at the vet... she jumps backwards and comments somthing like "amazing he still has that much spunk with sedation".

Knowing all of this about my little man I really did not want to take him to the vet because he gets so stressed and I did not want to add to it but about the 3rd day in I could tell he was not doing well and I was worried about dehydration so I loaded him up and off we went. On the way to the vet he howled and peed in his crate which then got all over him. Got to the vets office and they open the crate and pretty much stick him with the sedation needle, 2 seconds later he has diarryha all over himself.

Just as he is showing improvement from this yucky virus he gets a cold, Thank God for L-lysine. It is a vitamin/herb from the health food store. My vet has always recommended to start with this and if no improvement is seen to then bring in the babies. He is on the mends and beging to act like himself again. I could not be happier.  Now just waiting for another one to get it, it is highly contagious so it is to be expected. What Fun!!

Did you know:

You can check a cat for fever by touching the tips of their ears. If they are warm (or hot) you might want to call a vet. You can also check your cat for fever with an ear reader thomometer, they tippically run normal at around 101/102 degrees.  (Sadie was 105 when I took her in)

You can tell if a cat is dehydrated (just like with people) pull up on their skin if it goes back slowly they could be dehydrated.

Cats gums are typically pink, if they are white that means that the cat is pale.

Showing of the third eye lid is a sign of illness in at cat.

Mommy's Little Helper

Tigger, ya gotta love that cat. Cats are curious by nature and Tigger is no exception. In fact he has his nose into more than all of the rest of the babies combined. I have had Tigger since the day that he was born. I had found a ferrel mother with brand new babies (still wet). I brought them home and took care of them, Tigger was the only kitten to survive. I guess this is why he gets away with getting into everything.

Tigger likes to help me put away the towels.

Fold the laundry.

Inspect the shower to be sure that I have cleaned it good enough...

Putting away the dishes, can't even get the kids to do this.

Gets the laundry basket for me...

So we can unload the dryer.

Puts away the grocery's, again where are the kids??

Pest Control, one of my personal favorites.

Making the bed...

Checking for dust bunnies, he is sure to find them on top of the fridge...

Helping JJ unpack from camp, he missed her.

More Laundry... it's never ending.

I love my Tigger... but not so much at 2:30am when he opens the panty door and helps himself to a midnight snack!!!
( He needs to learn to be more quiet, the bag of chips makes a lot of noise.)





   






Growing Up Bigs

Bigs, the newest member of or furry little group of friends is growing up way to fast. He went to the vet today for a follow up and booster shots. We first got Bigs on May 16th when I took him to the vet a few days later he was .7 lbs. Today 3.4, He is alowed to run around the house all day now with the other babies and he really loves this. He has bonded well with Sadie and Gracie likley because they are closer in age to him. They are both under a year old, him being about 3 months old now. Its fun to watch him learn to do things. When he first started to venture out of his room  he would not even concider going down the stairs then when he did attempt it he had to basically jump down one step at a time. Now he tears up and down the stairs without even a thought. To climb the cat tree in our bedroom was out of the question now he scales the sides and jumps around it like he owns the joint. In my last blog I talked about how when we introduced hard food to him he loved it so much that he would growl at anybody that came close to the bowl (I have this on video but for some reason it would not load onto the blog and work, I am sorry, it is really cute). Well this week KK went off to camp again and he is doing so well with all of the other babies that we decided not to leave him in a room at night by himself, this of coarse went over BIG with him. Now he thinks he is all that... the first night he slept in my bed with me curled up by me most of the night (heaven for me) I know that he just misses his KK. Anyway... Tigger decided that he would like to join us and jumped up (at about 4am) well Mr. Bigs did not think he should have to share so he began to growl at Tigger keeping him at bay by my feet. Laughter at 4am, I will take it anytime.

Sadie, Bigs, and Gracie taking a nap.

Greedy Growler

Okay, Bigs is settling in really nicely, right... He loves and adores Kaley, she is totally his mommy, he follows her around, watches her get ready for school, sleeps with her, sits in her lap while she is on the computer, lucky girl.

He is even meeting the other kitties and everyone is playing pretty nice and getting alone quite well.

Bigs is a super sweet cat that purrs all of the time. When you come in the room and he has not seen you for a while he will roll on his back and ask you to rub his tummy. He is just a super sweet cat.

We took him to the vet the other day to start his shot and such. He weighed in at 1 pound!!!!

The vet said that we needed to introduce crunchy food to him.

The greedy little growler does have a fiesty streak in him, he finished the entire bowl, guess you could say he liked it.

Thank God he is also a very smart little kitty because he also figured out really quick that I was just messing with him and I did not REALLY intend to take his food away.  He does not growl anymore.

Sweet little teddy bear.

UPDATE

My original video was to long and would not upload.  Bigs has started doing the growling thing again so I took a shorter video and it uploaded.

8-10-11 Bigs is about 4lbs.

Buddy's???

We have 7 cats....  It amazes me when I watch the animal hoarding shows on T.V. or I hear of a family that has 20 cats. I think, Wow, wonder what daily life in their house is like? Every time we get a new cat it is always such a process for them to "make friends" with each other. I personally feel pretty lucky because we don't have to many problems with cat fights but they do happen. First of all Cuddles, we call her the crabby old lady, she does not appreciate any of the other cats. She will growl and hiss and even take a wack at any fur baby walking by, they pretty much know to leave her alone. To bad for her, she should have been in an only pet house.  I won't give her up though because she seems to manage okay and I think she would not do well being re-homed considering that when we moved to our new house she spent the first three years under our bed. She would come out in the middle of the night for the little box and food. Now most of her day is spent on the ottoman and every now and then I even catch her playing with a toy mouse.

Tigger has been nick named the bully kitty before Simon came along Milo got picked on regularly. Poor guy he is so sweet, does not deserve it. But Tigger would stalk and chase Milo and come back to me with wide eyes and black fur stuck in his claws, thank God he only got fur.  Now that we have Simon he takes most of the hits from my little bully, Tigger shows up with grey fur in his claws or in his mouth. Sometimes I wonder if it is just play but by the look on Simon's face... I don't think he likes that game.

Gracie and Sadie came into the picture and guess what, now the bully is being bullied, by two girls (ha ha), I love it. Tigger is scared to death of the little girls and will go all the way around a room to avoid them.  When we first got Sadie and Gracie they were pretty rough with all of the other babies but they are getting much better now, I can see friendships slowly building. Maybe one day they may even be able to share some nap time together.  If Tigger and Simon can do it, so can the bitty bully's.

                                               For a long time I never though I would see this.

                                                  Simon rolled over, even better, I love it!!!!!

Another day: Simon came up and laid by Tigger he was so fast asleep he did not realize Simon was there.

                             Simon took advantage of that....   REVENGE ON THE ORANGE BULLY!!!!!!!

                                                          Tigger knew he was there then.
We still have little kitty's fights here and there but we are doing much better and that makes the kitty mommy happy. Sadie and Gracie are working on being little ladies instead of bitty bully's.

Thank God for my food...

Simon, my Maine Coon has a very neat thing that he does. I love to see him do it and lately he has been doing it a lot.

The breeder that we got him from tells me that it is called a "begging" gene. She said that Simons grandfather also does it.  But sometimes I like to think that he is thanking God for his food.

But... he has also been known to do this in the window sill, while he is watching the birds. So with that I can see that he would be "begging" the birdies to come back.

                                                                    How cute is that?


                                                        I hope that put a smile on your face.