Missing Kitty :-(

Our cat, Fudge, has been missing for over two weeks. Gavin and I made a visit to a local animal shelter and the local SPCA to see if we could find him. Here he is playing with a couple of precocious kittens! No luck in finding him, though. Since we live so close to the channel, I think there's probably no hope of him coming back now.

Gavin's brother the cat

In the hierarchy of children Gavin is usually at the bottom, so instead of telling younger kids what to do he likes to tell the cat what to do as well as try to take care of him or play with him. He has fed him from his spoon, shared cat food with him, fed him cat food, pet him nicely, and also said, "Come on kitty," like he sometimes does with other kids around his age. Just prior to this picture, the cat had been laying down on the floor and Gavin had covered him up nicely as if he was going to take a nap (with his head outside the blanket). By the time I got back with the camera, he had completely covered the cat up and the kitty had turned around under it. Moment lost: I'm too slow! Oh well! So anyway, Gavin treating the cat like a brother is hopefully good practice for when his brother comes! He is usually pretty good with the cat and the cat is good to him as well.

Time with Fudge

Gavin has been spending quality time with his older brother.

Sharing his snack of yogurt. The cat was thrilled!





Let me get a little closer to the source of that yumminess...



Playing on the back of the couch with him. He thinks that he can do whatever the kitty does.





Neko (cat) is one of the words we have been trying to get Gavin to say in both English and Japanese. He has a one of those write on magnet boards in the car that includes four animal shaped magnets (they even have faces on the holding part), and one of the animal magnets is a cat. We were riding in the car on Saturday and Gavin said to the cat shaped magnet, "Whatcha doing nekos?" I that that was hilarious. For some reason he's been adding an 's' to Japanese words, we're not sure why. I thought that was a good sentence, though, because he would have said previously, "What doing?"

Snack Time

Gavin was ever so kind to share the kitty's food with him for a quick afternoon snack.



Blogger thinks it's smarter than me again...





Sorry this shot is blurry, I took it from an awkward angle. You get the idea.

Snack time with the cat

The other day I was in the kitchen putting away dishes and Gavin took the cat food and started walking around calling for him. He got really quiet so I went to look for him. He'd found the cat, all right! He joined him on our bed, tried to feed him his food, but then decided to have a snack for himself!!!

In the garden

Here is a picture of how my strawberry plants are doing. One is almost dead, I think that Marilyn, the chicken, at least in part killed it. She hops the chicken wire and then digs in the plants. I found the one that is dying buried in dirt. I'm sure that the plant didn't like that!



Here is my first ripe strawberry! It has a bug bite, but we ate it anyway. I shared it with Gavin, even though it was little. We both love strawberries.





A couple of my tomatoes that are growing outside the wire.



I have blossoms galore on my tomato plants!



They are still growing wildly!



Gavin, digging in the dirt as boys love to do.





He moved the shovelful of dirt all of like two feet and dumped it.



The kitty, ever watchful and wanting to be close, (you can see the planter wall of my garden to the left of the slide) but pretending that he could care less what we are doing.





Fudge says, "Oh, please just leave me alone!!!"

Sleepy Kitty

Last night the cat came up to me and laid down next to me while I was under the blanket. I had to get up and disturb him, but then I covered him up with the blanket. A little while later I came back out into the living room and he was still under the blanket. When I first came back out he looked at me with big eyes, and then closed them as if to say, "Oh, it's only you." He was sleeping on top of one of Gavin's books!



I was trying to get him to look at me, but he only graced me with cracking his eyes open a tiny bit.

Getting Along

The backyard animals all seem to have a truce going on. Al and Fudge don't seem to mind being near each other and sometimes seem to enjoy it. Here they are in the rabbit hutch Aunt Jessica made at the same time. Al is underneath the mesh and Fudge on top.

Weirdo Cat Alert

The cat loves to drink from running water, as I have mentioned before, or water he's seen come directly from the faucet. I have heard it's because when they were in the wild you don't want to drink from standing water because of bugs and other things that are attracted to it (like mosquitoes). We used to let him drink directly out of the sink, but then we got the fountain that recycles water. I have done it once or twice relatively recently as well and I was in the bathroom and he came up to the sink like he wanted me to give him water, but I didn't. So, instead he decided to take a rest in the sink. I can't imagine it was very comfy. It would be like laying in an empty bathtub with only a blanket for comfort.

Kitty Time

It's been a while since I've said anything about the cat, so here goes. The water level on his fountain (that recycles water in a little waterfall) was low and Daddy unplugged it, so he was thirsty. He practically attacked my cup when I left it unattended, so I thought I'd get some pictures. He loves fresh water, we can't leave a bowl lying around, so when I was drinking what he knew was fresh water, he wanted it!

I love how he smashes down his ears even though they aren't in the cup.

Sunset

We were outside playing at sunset (it gets dark so early now!) Gavin was playing with his newest spatula (at the time).



Look at that gorgeous sunset in the background.



So cute, I think (I'm not biased or anything!)





Talking to the kitty. I love how he bends down to talk to animals, babies, and even stuffed animals.

As you may have read...

...in the comments for last post, the cat did come down sometime during the night. It's been hard to post for two reasons the past couple of weeks: Matthew, and our computer was down. It turned out to only be the power supply that was the problem so we were lucky. Matthew and Gavin have only been giving me around 45 minutes or less to myself during the day (where they are asleep simultaneously). I do have several posts to update, but will be doing it later. I have been going to bed early because I have to be functioning at 7:00 am these days, which is no fun for me because I would sleep in given the choice. Even with Gavin at home by himself I felt like I didn't really function until noon, except on days where I actually left the house early, (even though I had physically gotten out of bed by 7:30 or so, hehehe.)

Up a Creek without a Paddle...

..or rather, up a pole without a ladder! Jessica told us that the cat had gotten scared by a dog and ran up one of the telephone poles in the backyard. I went outside to check on him and he was too scared to do anything. A couple of hours later, I checked on him again and he seemed like he wanted to come down and meowed at me plaintively. Well, Philip and and Jon got out the ladder and Philip was going to try to go up the pole, but it became apparent that that wasn't going to work because there weren't any foot holds in the pole, just holes where they should have been. Jon got the idea to use a two by four to prop it against the pole so that he could come down at a slant instead of straight down. The cat did not cooperate. Even with prodding from the pool skimmer, he either wasn't getting the point, or he was too scared. I even went to get some treats to try to tempt him, but to no avail. So, the two by four is still propped up between the brick fence and the telephone pole, just in case the cat gets brave during the night. We used up all of our efforts within half an hour: there was nothing more we could do.

Now we are just hoping that he doesn't break a leg or worse on the way down whenever he decides to try and venture down. Do you think that the fire department would really come rescue a cat like they do in the cartoons and movies? Philip thinks that they would probably charge for the service.

Hopefully the next post won't be his obituary.

Do you see his glowing eyes in this picture?

Play Time for Kitty

Gavin and I were in the backyard and I heard a tinkling of the cat's bell. Next thing I know, he's chasing the rabbit! It seemed to be harmless fun for the two of them. He never pounced on the rabbit or anything.

Nice Kitty

Lazy Bones

Sliding Cat

The cat has been spending more time outside ever since we realized that he was just hanging out in our yard. He likes to view his kingdom (All cats are royalty, right? At least they think so.) from the highest peak available, and this is a pretty good one. He no longer has roof access (thank goodness) since Jessica and Jon took out the apricot tree outside Gavin's window.

Gavin Vs. Fudge

Dad's Jacket Grew a Tail!

Somebody has a Death Wish!

Gavin LOVES the kitty, as I've mentioned. Today he has been especially insistent on trying to grab the kitty and his tail. I think he has a death wish will result in some scratching with the very sharp claws (which, I don't want to happen, but the cat does have a right to defend himself at some point and Gavin does need to learn to be gentle and not bug too much!) or the cat will figure out that he has to sleep in an out of reach position, like on our bed, or up by the window in Gavin's room.

What a way to be woken up! I think he almost got swiped today, hopefully the cat will get smart before someone gets hurt! (Oh, and by the way, Gavin is wearing a 24 month romper in this picture at 11 months old! He just won't stop growing! He also wore a 2T sleeper to bed last night and only the legs were a little long!)