LostWoods Blog

LostWoods Torianna of ForestKatz and HattKatts Guri of ForestKatz are the proud parents of six babies born over night. There are two little girls in the litter and I’ll be watching them very closely in case one of them needs to come to LostWoods to live with Grandma Shira and take over her duties as Queen of Everything someday. Or rather, Jim and Donna will be watching them closely and telling me if either of them looks like a worthy successor to the crown.  

Polgara’s eye is looking better today — the third eyelid is almost completely down. But she’s still squinting that eye a little and it’s watery. I know… Patience! But I hate it when my kittens have anything at all wrong with them, so I want it to be ALL better NOW! The sore eye is not slowing her down at all, but I still feel sorry for her.

One last thing before I get back to work… I have a new washer and dryer! Whee!!! I’m still learning how to use the options, but so far I really like them. They are both extra large capacity front loading machines, so that should save on electricity and water for us. Always a plus. But right now I’m mostly just happy I don’t have to go to the laundromat.  

Most of the new pictures are on the website, but I will post a picture of the Leprechauns here. This is the group shot I took the morning that Keiran left.

I’ve added 10 week and 12 week pictures of the MBs and the BBs to the website so have a look. The BBs have finally started that growth spurt I’ve been expecting — several of the kittens gained close to 10 oz this week.  Polgara got poked in the eye on Saturday — I think — so I did not post of new picture of her. Her eye is better today than it was Sunday, but still not very attractive. If I’m not happy with how it’s progressing by Friday morning, she will making a visit to the vet.

Some very sad news… my friend Brenda (co-owner of Comet, Beau, and McCoy) is on her way to Minnesota tonight. She’d planned to go on Friday, but got the call today that her mother is not expected to make it to Saturday. Her mom was diagnosed with lung cancer back in November of last year and has put up a valiant fight. Unfortunately, she’s losing the fight. Your prayers for Brenda, her mother Darlene, and the entire family are appreciated. And if any of you smoke, QUIT NOW! (that means you, Justin!)

I haven’t accomplished much this evening, but I did want to share a few of our pictures from the Meriwether Fire in the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness. The boat tours were running on Sunday so we did get to take the ride on Sunday. They didn’t go as far up the river as usual because the Forest Service was dipping water out of the river near Mann Gulch for fire containment, so Brian and Sondra didn’t get to see why it’s called “Gates of the Mountains”. But we did get a close view of an active forest fire — as close as I ever want to be.

On Friday we saw the fire threatening an area known as American Bar. Here is a picture of how it looked on Friday. The fire did come down much closer to the buildings before it was contained. Thanks to crews on the ground and the helicopter, the none of the buildings on American Bar were destroyed.

On Sunday we could see the fire burning in numerous spots along the river. Most were just spot fires and we could see where trees’ trunks had been scorched, but the trees spared. Other areas further from the river we could see great patches of burnt trees. It will be many years before the wilderness area recovers, but it will be a healthier forest when it does. A couple of pictures from the boat:

Good morning! I didn’t find time to write yesterday as we spent most of the day playing tourist. Or trying to play tourist. Ken and I are new enough to Helena that when people visit we really enjoy going to see the sights with them. Today we’re going down to Lewis and Clark caverns and Virginia City for the day. I haven’t been to either, so I’m especially looking forward to it.

Yesterday our plans included going on the Gates of the Mountains boat tour. There is a forest fire very near there — the Gates of the Mountains wilderness area is closed — but Ken called in the morning and their recorded message said they were still running. So we drove out there yesterday afternoon only to discover that they had cancelled the tours for the day. But we did get a fairly close view of the fire — scary, awesome — and saw a helicopter dip a pouch (don’t know the exact firefighting term, but that describes it anyway) into the river to get water. Then it flew off to drop the water on the fire. Seeing that little helicopter with it’s tiny load — so it appeared — over the huge fire showed just how truly huge the fire is. The load of water from the river was like using a bucket of water to douse a house fully engulfed in flame.

This particular fire had been allowed to burn for awhile. The terrain where it started is steep and inaccessible and there are two other fires in the area that are threatening homes. But as of yesterday, they do have crews on the ground fighting the fire, too — probably because it’s now closer to some structures and also into an area that is easier to get to.

I took some pictures with Jeremy’s small camera and if any of them are decent I’ll post one here later.

No real cat news this morning. Sondra and family are having fun playing with the kittens and the kittens are happy to have more devoted humans entertaining them. They keep saying they are taking this one or that one home with them. At this rate I’ll have no kittens when they leave! LOL!

Just a quick note this morning before I load up Comet, Catriona, Keegan and Fin for our trip to Colorado. Comet is going home to his Brenda-mom. Fin is going to a show this weekend in Longmont. Cati and Keegan are going along for the ride. I will be gone and without internet access until Monday night, so no blog entries for awhile. I might go into withdrawal… But one of the good things about shows is all the visitors who I get to talk to in person about Norwegian Forest Cats.

Fin is decidely naked — he looks like a short haired cat with a lovely, fluffy tail — so I’m not expecting him to do well. But it will be good experience for him. Plus I’ll get to catch up with friends I haven’t seen in months.

But before that, I’m first headed to northeastern Colorado to see my parents and a couple of my brothers and their families. It’s been way too long since I saw all of them, so I’m so looking forward to this trip. Well, maybe not the trip… I figure I have about 13 hours of driving ahead of me today. So I’d better get going!

Have a happy and safe 4th of July! Happy Birthday, USA!

In all the excitement yesterday I completely forgot about posting something here. Sorry!

We got up yesterday morning to discover we had no water. Great way to start the day. Right. Turns out the pump for our well had died so we had to replace it. I went to work for the morning while Ken stayed at home to wait for the pump service folks. About 5 p.m. we finally had running water again. Painfully expensive, but what can you do? It’s not like you can decide to put off replacing the pump for a few weeks. Running water is pretty much one of those daily necessities. Ken pointed out to me that even with this big expense, we’ll pay for the pump in less than a year based on what our city water rates would be if we were inside the city limits. I still didn’t enjoy writing that big check.

At noon I went to the airport to pick up a beautiful young silver tabby girl to be Peanut’s girlfriend for awhile. She’s a sweet girl with lovely big ears. She likes me. Peanut not so much. She has decided one of the closet shelves (one side of the litter closet has shelves from floor to ceiling) is a fine place to sit to keep an eye on him. He was VERY interested in her for the first couple hours, following her around and talking to her. But he got bored with her hissing and I later saw him hanging out of the window perch — his usual spot. I figure in a day or so they’ll be friends and by the time she goes into heat, she’ll be so used to him that she’ll be more than happy to let him breed her. (note here… this isn’t how I’d try to integrate a new kitten into a home with other cats. I’m still planning to write about that this weekend. I knew how Peanut would react to a new adult girl. The girl’s owner had filled me in on her girl’s personality, so I could make a guess  about how she’d behave. And I took the afternoon off so I could be there to check on them often and intervene if my guess about their behavior was wrong. I did have another plan if things weren’t going well.)

In kitten news… Yesterday morning Lelldorin discovered he could climb up on the pillow leaning against the nightstand (decorative pillow, thrown on the floor at bedtime). From there he could get to the nightstand and from there to the bed. Whee! New territory to explore! Then Taiba became the first one to join us in bed at about 3 this morning. She climbed up the blanket hanging off the side and came over between us. She repeated the feat about about 6, right before we got up. She is such a happy little girl! She purrs and purrs. She’s got the “flop and purr” gene. :-) If you start petting her — and she’s not too busy for loves — she flops over on her side and starts purring. “More! More! Pet me more!”

It won’t be long before all nine babies will be up on the bed with us at night. I saw Cyra trying to figure out how Taiba did it. Again, little Cyra and Zak — especially Cyra — just don’t get that they are younger than the other kittens. If the big kids can do it, so can they. Cyra’s also been investigating the food the kittens eat. She’s not eating much, but she has sampled it. Zak just wants his mom.   

Off to another busy day at work. Have a good day!

Even though I just took pictures of the Leprechauns on Monday, I’ve still updated their page with 13 week photos. What can I say, I’m a glutton for punishment!

That leads to a question about how I get my beasties to pose so well. I don’t. Not really. I just have a pretty good digital camera and I take a lot of photos. Most weeks I take about 15-25 pictures of each kitten just to get one or two I’m happy with. Some weeks I’m lucky and I have a bunch I like, but that’s rare. All I can say is thank goodness for the wonders of digital cameras because I’d be in the poor house trying to do this on film. The other answer I have for how to take pictures is to put the kittens on something that is about eye height and use a teaser and/or funny noises to get their attention. From six to ten weeks that works fairly well. With NFCs once they get to be over 10 weeks you never know when they might decide to jump from the height, though. I’ve had little monster kittens leap from the cat tree onto my head in an effort to get the teaser when I’m trying to take pictures! For the group shots, I like to wait until they’ve just fallen asleep or I know they are getting sleepy, then line them up and hope for the best. It works now and then.

Another question was how come I only have litter shots on the gallery pages up to the WOT Rulers. Well, it’s because I’ve been very lazy and not put my fun shots on the gallery pages at all in the past couple years. Shame on me! I do plan to do some work on that part of the site this fall. (I’d say “soon” but I know I won’t be doing it with kittens in the house — too many other things to do.) My hosting provider has free gallery software to organize photos, so I think I’ll convert my current gallery over to that and then add a bunch of photos from the past two years. I do have litter shots of all the litters that will be posted there eventually.

As for intergrating a new kitten into your home… I’m not going to have time to write about that tonight — I need to get to bed! But I will try to write some on this subject later this week. By the way, congratulations of the new baby fur ball!

Leprechaun 13 week weights:

Catriona - 43.5 oz

Keegan - 42.4 oz

Keiran - 52.8 oz

Well, I missed my update yesterday. I was busy with some more work on the SassafrasKat site and also following up on kitten inquiries. Still have more to do with both, though.

I haven’t seen the gray shorthair kitty that I saw the first night and the next morning since then, so I’m in big need of a cat fix. I get daily reports from home on how the babies are doing, but it’s not the same as being there and seeing/touching/playing with them myself. I’m sure the BBs and MBs have changed a lot in the six days I’ve been gone — at their age, they change practically overnight.

Class gets out today about 11:30, despite all the course materials saying 5:00. This is the second time this has happened to me at an IBM class. While it’s nice to be FREE! I am not flying home until morning. In some places this would be great — like when I went to class in Colorado where my social calendar is fuller than full. But out here I’d just as soon known I’d be out early and I’d have flown home this afternoon. Next time I’ll make my reservation to go home in the afternoon/evening whether the course description says we won’t be out until 5 or not.

Anyway, enough whining… After class I’m off to sightsee or shop or a little of both. I haven’t done much of either this week and this is a beautiful area. I’ve been wanting to come out and spend time on the Olympic penisula, but that won’t happen this trip. Ken and I have been talking about coming out in August to see Heather, Patrick, and Brasen and sightsee then. Don’t know if we’ll get up to Washington or if we’ll confine our adventures to Oregon on that trip. One thing that is nice about Montana, though, is that we’re close enough to drive out for a long weekend if we want. So one of these days I’ll get my wish to explore the penisula more.

Little bit of cat cotent… Peanut’s girlfriend from back east is coming next week — probably Wednesday — to stay for awhile. She’s a darling little girl — at least in looks — and I’m looking forward to meeting her in person. Her owner says she’s a sweetie personality-wise, too. I’ll try to get some pictures of the furry lovers once they are used to each other. Comet goes home next weekend, unless Brenda and my plans change. I’ll miss the lover boy, but it will good for him to be back with his Brenda-mom. He’s not used to having to spend his time in one room and not getting to cuddle with his people whenever he wants. I feel bad for him when he’s here because although I give him loves, it’s not nearly as much attention as he gets at home. I know he’s lonely for his other family.

I am making progress with my website work. Stop by Sassafraskat (link on the right) to see my grandkittens - The Irish Cupboard Kids — and their parents, while you’re at it. Deb has been working on the site, too, so maybe between the two of us, we’ll finally get it finished.

The Leprechauns are 12 weeks old today. Sorry, no new pictures, but I’ll take some on Saturday when I get home. In the meantime here are their 12 week weights:

Catriona - 40.0 oz

Keiran - 46.6 oz

Keegan - 38.9 oz

My Seattle update for the day… I went shopping at Bellevue Square on my lunch break — getting a mall fix. We do have a mall in Helena, but it’s one of the more pathetic malls I’ve ever visited. I think even the one in Glenwood Springs (flashback to my Aspen days) was better. Maybe. So I have really been looking forward to going to a real mall. I didn’t buy much — a couple of Christmas gifts. But it was nice to just wander through interesting shops for a change. This evening I got some dinner and came back to my room to work on web stuff. Boring, I know. We are supposed to get out early on Friday, so I think I’ll do some sightseeing that afternoon.

I arrived safe and sound last night, although finding the hotel was a little challenging. All the signage seems to be oriented to people coming from the other direction, so I missed the entrance the first time I went by. It’s very green and lush out here — expected, but still it leaves me feeling rather envious. On the other hand, it’s also more humid and even though it was only in the mid-60s today, it seemed warm and sticky to my arid climate acclimated self. Class is good and I expect I’ll learn a lot this week.

Ken weighed the BBs this evening and (at my request) emailed the results to me. So here they are:

Taiba - 13.4 oz

Lelldorin - 14.6 oz

Belgarath - 15.4 oz

Garion - 16.6 oz

Kheldar - 15.2 oz

Ce’Nedra - 14.8 oz

Polgara - 16.6 oz

Polgara had an especially good week, catching up with the big boy of the litter, Garion. She’s really turning into a beauty, too. I just love her look.

Crazy cat lady that I am, I already miss the cats. Last night I had to go back out to the car to retrieve my cell phone. A blue tabby shorthaired cat was roaming the parking lot. He was obviously someone’s pet as he was wearing a collar and tags — and was very friendly. I stopped to talk to him and pet him a bit before coming back to my room. Saw him again this morning as I was leaving. Even though I wish his owners wouldn’t let him run loose, I did enjoy getting a short cat fix.