Caturday: Halloween III

 In honor of Caturday, here are my very favorite Halloween decorations:



The black one is Treat and the orange one is Trick. :-)

The kittens (I still call them that, even though they're a year old now and ginormous) came to live with us September of last year, when they were just 5 weeks old. Their mom was a feral cat who lived in the fields near my son's school. Originally each of the guys in his class was going to adopt one of the kittens, but when the time came to take them, nobody did. My son brought these two home so that we could take them to the animal rescue at which we were volunteering. However, the rescue wouldn't take them until they were 8 weeks old, so we had to foster them for 3 weeks. Yeah, you know how that goes. We hoped to catch the mom and her other babies and take them to the rescue for neutering, but the next day she had taken the others away and my son couldn't find her.

I did some learning about how to care for kittens that young. They were able to eat dry food soaked in water, so no bottle feeding was necessary. I learned that we had to handle them a lot to get them used to people. It was a good thing we got them at 5 weeks, because from what I read, you have to start handling them before they are 6 weeks old, or they will be much more likely to stay feral. They lived in our dog crate for the first week or so, which had plenty of room for a small litter box, their food and water, and a bed for both of them. Of course we brought them out of the crate lots to play and cuddle. Then they graduated to staying in our office, plenty big enough for them to roam around a bit without getting into too much trouble. Except when they wanted to chew on the electrical cords, which fortunately wasn't too often.

Now they are huge monsters, obviously well nourished. And so cuddly and sweet. They look completely different from each other, not just markings, but the shape of their bodies and faces. And their personalities are different. But they are both very affectionate. They love each other very much and often cuddle together and clean each other. Sometimes they fight and chase each other around the house. They are good for hours of entertainment. They still pursue their kitteny mission of destroying the house, but they have begun to take on their adult cat mission of not allowing us to work too hard. About 10 minutes after I start studying, one or the other of them is on my book or in my face, demanding pets.

I do love my Halloween babies. :-)