on and on and on...

I don't even remember who was next. It seems like the never ending stream of kittens just has been going on forever. This little guy and his 2 siblings were too young for solids. Affectionately known as "bottle babies," these guys came to work with me. This was when I still had my shop on Wilson Blvd. This is Petey. I was trying to upload his brothers, but it keeps crashing, so Petey it is. This group was Petey, Bear and ....crap. Again, long time ago!

Right around this litter, I was at the vet for something with the little guys, and I met a woman that does wildlife rescue. We chatted about the babies, and she told me she was writing a children's book, and was going to need some color copies. Being a printer, I of course said I could help her and gave her my card.

A few weeks later she did show up an we made some copies for her...then, a few weeks after that, I got a call from her. She said, "I know you do foster care for kittens, and my friend found a kitten all by itself at a construction site in Georgetown. Will you take it?" Well, sucker that I am, I said sure. I planned to take it to the shelter, and get it into the foster program, but there were so many cats there already, and since she was a single, I decided to keep her. That would be Ripley. She is still here, a permanant resident.

Round 2

Our second litter came in at the heels of the first, which is good. It helped to get over the "loss" of those little guys. This litter was a mom, and 7 babies. The babies are seen here. I will try to remember their names, but they were a little older when we got them, and didn't stay as long. Mama is Lillian, named by my friend Kim, who did eventually adopt her. The kitten that looks like her is Emily, there was Gabby and Maddie, Merlin...Ugh. I waited too long to get this down. I can't remember the other names! Oh well...There have been so many. Maybe they will come to me at a later date.

These guys were nuts. OK, Lillian was nuts. She still is, and I do see her every now and again.

We had a Great Dane at that time, Molly, who really didn't even acknowledge any of our cats. We also had Shatzi, who was a pretty ill tempered old girl when it came to other cats. Of course, we were also told that we needed to keep the fosters separate from our own animals, to prevent spreading of anything either way. Well, that proved to be a difficult proposition with this group. Lillian had just about had enough of this kitten thing, so she would do her best to escape as soon as we tried to get in the door! Of course, then all 7 babies would follow. Finally, we took one of Molly's big foam dog beds, and we would bow it out, and set it in the doorway before we could open it. Of course, Lillian would fly overtop, and run into another room to get a break from all those babies. Can't say I blame her.

All those babies got adopted right away, and of course, so did Lillian.

In the beginning...

My first post! First, I guess I should provide a little background. In May of 2005, we received our first litter of foster kittens. As you can see from the photo I took with my cell phone when I picked them up, they were 6 orange tabbies, almost identical. We named them Dakota, Jack, LT (Little Tony) Latte, Sadie and Lilly. At the time I thought they were a handful, but looking back now, I know how easy that litter was. They were all eating solids, they were healthy, and perfect.

Of course, we fell in love with them all, and considered adopting one of them! The organization we provide this service to has a rule. No foster provider can adopt until they have been fostering for 90 days. This may sound harsh, but it is truly a good rule. It takes 90 days for you to realize you will fall in love with all of them, and you can't keep them all. It was hard, but now we have a lot more will power.

So, 3 years and over 80 cats later, we still enjoy it. Last year was difficult, as there were more sick kittens, and we lost some. It is heartbreaking, but you do as much as you can. For a while it seemed like every litter we got ended up sick. We lost all 5 kittens of one litter, the mom and 3 of 5 kittens from another. The 2 surviving kittens from the last litter from last year were so sick, I was not sure I wouldn't lose them too, but we struggled, and fought, and they made it. We also had those two for almost 6 months! That was Mimi, and Minnie. (Or Mini Mimi). They both finally got adopted, although Minnie had such a bad eye infection when she was tiny that they had to remove it. Not that it slowed her down any. Both of these girls were delightful, once they felt better, and were as playful as any we had fostered.

This year we are now on litter #3. We have Robyn, who is back for round 2. She was also with our second litter, but much smaller than they were, so she is back with 4 other kittens. Noah, Natalie, Reuben and Sullivan. More on theses guys after work.