Ferdinand bathing Maria, and Maria returning the favor.
Mariette’s crazy little face in the background is cracking me UP.
Sweet babies.
Orlando, lookin’ smug.
Ferdinand keeps an eye on things.
Orlando, batting at a beetle.
I believe I mentioned that in the Fall, the Lady Asian Beetle invasion begins. We’re swarmed with the stupid insects, all looking for a place to hibernate. They come in around the windows (despite the work we’ve done in trying to seal the spaces around the windows), crawl all over the place, stain my curtains bright orange, and then die (the ones who don’t get sucked up by the vacuum or find a crack in the wall to enter. I suspect we have thousands of dead and hibernating beetles in our walls). Then, all Winter long, the instant the temperature gets above 50, they come out of hibernation, stretch and yawn, and say “Is it Spring ALREADY?” Which is to say that all late Fall and Winter long, we have those beetles in our house. I suck them up with the vacuum during the course of my regular vacuuming (if I got out the vacuum special every time I saw one of the beetles, I’d be doing nothing else all day long).
The beetles especially love the foster room, because it gets sun all day long (when it’s sunny), and so they think it’s time to wake up and crawl around. Luckily, the kittens like playing with the beetles, but don’t eat them (they must not smell very appetizing). So I’m forever vacuuming up flattened Lady Asian Beetles, too.
My glamorous life: you know you want it.
“I haz a basket,” says Orlando, smugly.
Hallo, gorgeous.
Another beetle, flattened.
And sticking to the bottom of Mariette’s foot.
On Sunday, Fred started harassing me about letting the kittens out of the foster room to roam around the upstairs. I fought it for a little while – I really had wanted to let the permanent residents have the whole weekend to recover from the visit by that TERRIFYING Molly – but ultimately gave in. I had thought that we would put the baby gates up across the bottom of the stairs (we stack them, which blocks the entire doorway), but Fred wanted to put the barrier across the end of the hall, and then one baby gate at the bottom of the stairs.
“So if one gets past the barrier, we’ll hear them, and we can block off the stairs!” he said brightly.
I set up the barriers, opened the foster room door, and then went about my day. As I’d expected, the kittens sat in the foster room, staring out into the hallway, and said “We’re not going out THERE. We’ll die!” Eventually they started venturing out, though if they heard the noise of someone coming up the stairs, they ran right back into their room.
A couple of hours after I’d opened the door, I heard the distinctive sound of a kitten coming over the barrier at the end of the hall. I got up and went to the bottom of the stair. Fred had been napping in his room, so I called up to him.
A second later, Dennis came FLYING down the stairs, sailed over the baby gate (I didn’t have a chance to stop him), and went flying into the front room.
I won’t give you the blow-by-blow, but it took us about 20 minutes to capture him. He ran around this house like he KNEW all the good hiding spots, and ended up way up inside Fred’s recliner. He fought like crazy once Fred captured him, and then we put all the kittens back in the foster room and shut the door.
On Monday, we put all the gates up across the bottom of the stairs, and opened the foster room door again. So far, it’s working. The kittens come to the bottom of the stairs and look around occasionally, but spend most of their time running around upstairs. I’ve tried to convince Jake and Stefan to go upstairs and visit the kittens, but neither of them has been all that interested. I’m sure that, given enough time, they’ll be willing to check it out. There’s DIFFERENT food up in that kitten room, after all!
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Stinkerbelle keeps an eye out for her beloved Tommy.
“You’re getting too close, lady! You better back it OFF.”
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Previously
2013: Note to Tommy: it’s impossible to look scary in a blue cape.
2012: “I like to get as close to Mama’s face as possible. It’s more comfy up here.”
2011: No entry.
2010: No entry.
2009: No entry.
2008: “Woe is me, and when will the suffering ENNNNND?”
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.