Kittens!

Warning: This is a long, picture-heavy post, but it is full of cuteness!

R and I are now the foster parents of five 4-week-old kittens. Are we crazy? Quite possibly. Will it all be worth it? Absolutely.

Let me go back to the beginning of the story...

When we moved into our house, we were greeted by the many cats who lived here before us. Two of them were pets of R's cousin who previously lived here. When his cousin moved just a few hundred yards away, the cats would not go. They stayed here, so we feed them. They are spayed and neutered. No big deal. But we also had some feral cats on the property. If you're not familiar with feral cats, they are basically stray cats who have never had contact with humans and are terrified to be around us. We started with several feral cats that have come and gone, but now we pretty much just have one. Liddy. (Weird name, but there's a story behind it).

We woke up on the morning of Cash's birthday (coincidentally) and found Liddy and some kittens in a box on our porch (the box that R made for the cats to sleep in during the winter).

She kept them there for 2 days and then moved them to a large bush a few feet away from the house.

The bush was a great place for them, protected from the elements, and we would check on them every day while she was eating on the porch. The plan was to leave them with her for several weeks until we could take them in and try to socialize them. Feral kittens learn from their mothers very early on, and even a 6-week-old feral can spit and hiss at humans.

Around 3 weeks old, they were starting to get more active and would actually crawl out of the bush to come see us when we went to check on them. At that point we knew we needed to formulate a plan.

We cleaned out our guest room and started accumulating everything we would need to take care of 4-week-old kittens. It is was a difficult decision to make. On one hand, the kittens need to be with their mother as long as possible, for many reasons, but on the other hand, the longer we leave them with her the harder it will be for us to catch them and socialize them so that they can be adopted out to new homes.

We brought them inside yesterday evening and they have done great so far. Well, let me correct that. Last night was a challenge getting some of them to eat, but today has been much better. I'm really hoping everything stays ok.

Let me introduce to you the newest (temporary) members of our family...