Four Little Rascals and Their Mama: Our Foster Kittens are Three Weeks Old!

Dill and Fennel

 Welp, they're definitely messier than they were a week ago! I'm currently spending all my teaching money on puppy pee pads, wet kitten food, and wood pellet litter, but if a hobby doesn't take up all your time and even more of your money, then what kind of hobby even is it?

selfie with Sage

Dill and the teenager

The babies really woke up this week. I miss their wobbly little uncertain steps, but watching them play fight and chase each other is also incredibly cute. They're still nursing regularly, but they've all gotten the hang of their wet kitten food by now, and they and Ginger are easily going through three cans a day on top of Ginger's dry food (that I've also seen a kitten or two snack on). It's so different from every other litter we've ever had, that we've always had to bribe with pureed baked chicken to start putting on weight!

doing our best to make Sage an ipad baby

picture of two mamas!

Even Sage, who I suspect isn't quite the same age as his siblings, FINALLY started chowing down by the end of the week--little dude put on over two ounces in two days!

Sage FINALLY eating his nice wet food!

We're done with quarantine, and although I'm still not giving the kittens any freedom (and Ginger keeps getting herself put back in kitten jail for essentially beelining straight to my dwarf pomegranate, mouth already open for munching, as soon as we let her out), it's nice to be able to bring them out of their room to hang out with us, rather than having to chill out on the floor of the cramped kids' bathroom whenever we want to visit them.

Sage not enjoying his field trip into the outside world

family portrait on my lap

We're probably not technically done with ringworm quarantine, but we're done with changing clothes every time we touch the kittens, so I guess that's us done with ringworm quarantine! If I have to admit in a few weeks that we all have ringworm, feel free to shame me. I'll deserve it.

Clove, Dill, and Fennel

My favorite kitten is still a kitten who's sleeping and purring on my lap, so I like most to snatch one up just as they're all settling down for a nap so it can come and snooze on me instead. I also really like Zooming with my college student from the kitten room; essentially we just spend an hour with me holding kitten after kitten up to the camera, and her squealing at them in such a high pitch that her computer's microphone can't even pick it up. She's coming home for a visit in a few days to watch her sister perform in our town's Trashion/Refashion Show, and I think she'll be hard-pressed to divide her days between the kittens and her dog!

Clove is my snooze buddy

Now that everyone's over the hump of possible illnesses and all the babies are gaining weight, all we really have to do with them is love them, feed them, socialize them, and clean up after them. This is the part where they work their way into my heart and I get so attached to them that I cry for days when we finally have to bring them back to the shelter so their forever families can come adopt them.

Dill is my other best snoozer

I should probably take more pictures of what their bathroom looks like every single morning and just look at that when I miss them...