Monday 28 November 2011

A(nother) new member of the family!

Oops, I seem to have seriously broken my 2011 resolution of "no more pets".  Not only did we buy Katie a horse in September, but we seem to have acquired a darling little kitten too.

A few weeks back an adorable and very shy tortoishell puss began to visit the stables.  She was constantly miaowing, asking and asking to be fed (she'd steal the chicken food) but was very wary of coming to close to us humans.  Naturally we (Katie, me and the yard owner) gave in to her constant pleas and fed her.  She obviously appreciated our kindness because a couple of nights later she decided to come back with her two adorable little kittens! 

The yard owner's husband (who opens up in the mornings) found them snuggled amongst the hay - what a cute (and surprising) sight that must have been!  One's ginger and white and the other is a beautiful tabby.  As soon as we saw them we'd decided that the tabby would be ours (which was rather lucky as the yard owner had taken a shine to the ginger and white - now called George).
Tilly & George
Tilly and George a couple of days after we found them.

During the couple of weeks following their arrival, we had a few ups and downs with the kittens.  Tilly (or Kitty Eden as she's often called) - our tabby kitten, would go missing - sometimes falling behind the wooden panels resulting in us having to prize them off to leave drafty big holes around the backs of the stables and hay barn!  Mum cat actually took both kittens away for good for 24 hours which left us completely devastated.  The yard owner found George in the ditch, but no sign of Tilly at all (she continued to look until 9.30 that night).  Luckily Mum sauntered back with Tilly in the morning.  As Tilly seemed to be so accident prone, we decided she was probably old enough (as neither were suckling) to take her home.  Mum was happy with George and after the initial miaowing protests towards us as we drove off with Tilly, she settled down and seems set to stay as a yard cat.

Tilly's settled in so well at home.  Allie has treated her to an all over bath and Kan has stared and growled at her a few times.  Pepper, being Pepper, just runs away in total fear!  Poppy initally thought the new arrival was a rabbit.  Lots of heavy panting and nudging with her big nose, but now, although still excitable around her, she hasn't shown any signs of hurting her.  This week we've decided to let Tilly roam the house as she was crying to be let out of Katie's room (where she was staying).  Let's just say both dog and kitten get worn out eventually and sleep very soundly!
Tilly
Tilly, probably about 7 or 8 weeks old.

1 comment:

Sally said...

So cute! Reminds me of when ours were so small....although have to say good choice with the tabby. Whilst we love our ginger, he was a total livewire as a kitten! (my feet bore the scars for motnsh lol) :-)