Kittens

Kora with Zara and Mako

Zelda

Zara

Zia

Chi

Karma and Zoe

kitten pile on Karma - what a patient cat :)

Some recent pics of all our foster kitties... They're all healthy, happy, and full of energy. Mako went to his new home last week, and I miss him so much, but I'm glad that he has found his forever home. We're still trying to find a home for Karma and Chi. Everyone wants cute little kittens I guess, not an adult cat and a black kitten, but I'm still hopeful that one day someone will come along and realize how amazing they are, and give them a loving home. In about a week or two the girls will be ready for adoption. I'll miss them all so much. They all have such wonderful, unique personalities, and my life will definitely be more boring without insane kittens running around my room, playing, purring, sitting in my lap while I read a book, and brightening my day.

Animals Everywhere!

Four new foster kittens! 4-week-old sisters Zia (brown tabby), Zelda (gray tabby), Zoe (white and gray), and Zara (brown tabby and white). We got them on Wednesday and, although they were very hissy at first, which is to be expected of kittens who were rescued from who knows where and then shuffled between homes, they are now becoming very sweet and playful. When we fist got them they were covered in fleas so we had to keep them separate from the other kitties while we treated them. Now we are hoping to move them in with Kora and Mako this afternoon after Karma and Chi head off to their adoption fair (hopefully they will find homes this weekend!) As you can see from the second pic, Karma and Chi easily welcomed Kora and Mako, and they have definitely enjoyed playing and cuddling with each other this week. Caring for 7 kittens and a cat has definitely kept me extremely busy lately. Seems like I've been doing nothing but feeding cats :) The third picture is another animal visitor that I am very excited about. I just put out a hummingbird feeder a couple days ago, and this little guy was our first customer!

New Kittens!

Two new additions to our foster kitten family: Kora (the calico girl) and Mako (the orange tabby). I guess when you let brothers name kittens they get named after cartoon characters :) Karma and Chi are still looking for homes but we decided we had a little extra room in our home and hearts, and these two are fitting in perfectly. Mako and Kora are unrelated, and we are guessing that Mako is about 4 weeks old, and Kora around 3 weeks. Mako is doing great; he is eating well, playing, and purring. Kora is doing okay, but she's still a bit dehydrated and fragile. At first Chi was very jealous of the two (after being a slightly spoiled only child for so long), but now he has found a playmate in Mako, and he is loving his role of big brother. Mako and Chi are always chasing each other around and wrestling. Chi knows to be a little gentle, and Mako doesn't seem to be at all intimidated by wrestling with a kitten more than twice his size. Kora isn't quite up to joining in the rough housing yet. Right now she just loves being held, she is super sweet, and probably the cutest kitten I've ever seen! Karma still isn't quite sure what to think of having two new kittens. At first she pretty much pretended they didn't exist, but this morning she was letting them nurse for a bit and grooming them. (While Chi glared from a distance ;) I'm sure I'll have more pics and stories soon!

Appreciate

"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it."

-Confucius

Yesterday morning started out bad, but then I walked into my room and found it filled with sunlight, and saw my foster kitten looking out the window at the roses. It was so beautiful and perfect, a reminder to appreciate the things we have, like sunshine, kittens, and roses :) And it turned out that I had a wonderful day, wandering around Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park with my best friends in the world. 

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.”

- Frederick Keonig

Video of Karma and Chi

Chi is three weeks old now. I think this is the most fun age with kittens; the time when they're just starting to explore their world. He's climbing out of the box, walking, following everything with his curious blue eyes, and, of course, trying to wrestle with his mom. Here's a video of him attacking her... she's so patient :)

Chi

Chi is healthy, happy, and growing fast :) 

    “Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.”

- Gandhi

It's easy to get overwhelmed by the number of things that are wrong in the world. According to the Humane Society of the United States, 4 million cats and dogs are euthanized every year. I can't save the lives of 4 million animals, but I can save the life of one kitten, and that matters. Every good deed, every step in the right direction is important, no matter how small, or seemingly insignificant. Even the biggest problems must be solved one step at a time, with everyone doing their own small part to make a big difference. The sooner that people realize this, the sooner we can do something about the issues we face.

Foster Kitties

We got some new foster kitties on Monday! One mama, who we named Karma, and one baby boy, who we named Chi. We got them from a woman who said that the mama had given birth to five or six litters before, and all of the kittens had died, and that they hadn't gotten her spayed because she "wasn't their cat". She also was keeping Karma and Chi in her garage (in this cold stormy weather we had this last week!), and couldn't get them to us over the weekend because it was her birthday weekend. You definitely have to deal with people on both ends of the spectrum in animal rescue; the people who do so much to help animals, and then the people who are either inhumane, selfish, or not smart enough to do things like spay their cat before six litters of kittens die. I think this Gandhi quote is very fitting for the experience we had with these kitties.

"You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty."

- Gandhi

Now to the happy part. Karma and Chi are doing great. We are guessing Chi is about 1 to 1-1/2 weeks old. He's gaining weight steadily, starting to open his eyes, and absolutely adorable! Karma is super sweet, and loudly purrs pretty much 24/7. Karma is a great mama, and the two of them are always cuddling.