A Little Squirt

Our house is full of pets. Nick has Muska, Seth has Indy, I have Chloe and Sam had, well... Chloe was to be her dog, but Chloe wanted to be my dog (sigh).

Indy in the back resting his head on Muska. Chloe is the front soaking up Muska's warmth in an effort to stop quivering. 

So my little girl was sad, all she wanted was her own little animal to snuggle with. She kept begging us to let her have a kitten. Since I've had cats my whole life and the hives I was getting from cats back in 2007 haven't come out for a number of years we thought we'd give it a try. Sam's Aunt Jeanie's cat just had kittens and we were given the okay to bring her home on Christmas. The kids spent the last half of Winter Break with their dad which worked out perfect! I brought the kitten home a few days early to give it a test run before the kids would be back. No hives - she was going to be a keeper. When the kids got home, they were oblivious to the little black head poking out of my jacket. About 15 minutes passed before Sam spotted her. She was ecstatic! Let's name her Snuggles, Light Bulb, or Olive. I was drinking a can of Squirt and Nick said - how about naming her Squirt. Sam loved it, well second to Snuggles. She would go back and forth between calling her those two names. With a decision that had to be made Sam went with Squirt. The kids thought it was hilarious when we needed to squirt Squirt with water when she was digging in plants or clawing on furniture.

One day last week Squirt starting talking a lot more and acting strange. Uh-oh... we held off getting her spayed to long and our little one was going into heat. I looked online and read how they get more vocal as they call for male cats to come mate with them. That they spray their estrogen packed urine on verticle objects such as walls our cabinets. Oh man! Not in this house! I made a call to the vet for her pre-op and surgery. We dropped her off Tuesday night after a painful episode of getting her first set of injections. I think people down the block could hear her screaming. Wednesday morning she was spayed and her front claws removed. Thursday we were given the clear to pick her up and take her home. $418 dollar later she was our new little rag doll.

Our little cone-head would plop wherever she was set down. In the past week since getting her home she has been a lazy little loafer. Sleeps all day, snuggles all night, and tolerates Sam picking her up to have her lay on her lap. Where did our off-the-wall kitten go? She used to race through the house jumping off the sides of the couches towards the wall, where she would push off and dash around the dining room table. She was so energetic and fun to watch. Now she just lays there. Although she is still reliable in the area of tracking her litter around the entire house. For now it is newspaper shreddings, which is better than stepping on litter I must say!