Scratcher of heads, rubber of bellies
This weekend we finally gave Trixie free reign of the house. She joined me in bed last night and is asleep in my lap at the moment. This picture is from a week ago when we were giving her limited time outside the guest room, you can see in her wide eyes that she was a little too hopped up to be let loose on the other cats full time. That’s Sam beside me on the stairs, trying to decide just what to make of his new little sister.
Trixie’s introduction to the rest of the family is proceeding apace but she’s not yet been given free reign of the house, we’re still keeping her in the guest bedroom at night and while we’re away. Boo is still rather uneasy around her but he is making progress and in the past couple of days has been willing to play when she’s around. Trixie, for her part, seems quite comfortable in her new home, as you can see when she stretched out on my legs a few days ago. You can see where they shaved her belly for the surgery when she was spayed.
Despite being off work for two days, when looking at my task list I didn’t get much done, although it feels like I’ve accomplished a lot, helping the pets work through the stress of Trixie’s arrival.
I was most concerned about Boo given his recent stress reaction so I was pleasantly surprised yesterday morning when he climbed into my lap while I was having breakfast. He settled in for a long nap which concerned me as I still had to get up to walk Ellie, so I waited as long as I could then gently placed him back on the couch when I got up. Perhaps he’s been learning from Sam, as he got up and took my nicely warmed spot.
He was still there when I got back from our walk so I sat down and put him in my lap and he fell back asleep. Later when I had to get up I came back to find him right back in my spot, so this time I let him be and sat next to him. Sam came in and curled up in my lap and that’s how the three of us spent the morning, until I at last got up for some lunch and came back to see Sam had taken my new spot.
I left the brothers curled up beside each other and Ellie and I went up to join Trixie for some quiet time in her room. She curled up in my lap and that’s how we spent the afternoon. A lazy day, but a good one.
My wife left town on Wednesday and I was to take over spending the night with Trixie, plus getting up early to feed the pets, and walking Ellie in the morning as well as the evening. Already exhausted, it just seemed a little too much to manage to make it to work on time and get a reasonable amount of sleep, but thankfully Thursday and Friday were fairly open in my schedule so I took them off. Combined with a holiday on Monday I’m home for five straight days.
I’m thankful for that, as the introductions have begun.
My first task was to figure out sleeping arrangements for Wednesday night. Ellie usually sleeps in our bedroom on the dog bed or our bed, and since she had already met Trixie without eating her, I brought her dog bed into the guest bedroom and Ellie, Trixie, and I spent the night there. It all went well at first, I don’t know if she’ll grow out of it but Trixie is a snuggler when she sleeps, sometimes even curling up under your chin. Ellie took to her dog bed and we all drifted off to sleep.
At about 3:30 a.m. I woke to a tiny, snuggly orc chewing on my face and poking me with her claws. I petted her and explained in my best orc tongue that this was not the time for playing. She finally calmed down and we fell asleep until 5 a.m. when a loud and angry goblin began caterwauling outside our door. I assured him that feeding time wasn’t until 6 a.m. and would he please let me get some sleep, but my goblin speech is not as good as my orc, and he persisted.
At 6 a.m. I got up to feed Ellie and Sam and Boo and give Ellie and Trixie their pills and scoop the litter boxes and then snuggled up with Trixie to try and go back to sleep. Unfortunately I was wide awake but I did finally fall back asleep, getting up at 9 a.m. for some breakfast and to take Ellie on our walk.
This all repeated verbatim last night, except that Ellie joined us in the bed, so I’m especially thankful that I was able to be off work. I’ve been letting Trixie explore the house more and more, but she still greets the other cats with too much enthusiasm so there hasn’t been much progress there. She did eventually get pretty tired, it’s a stressful business exploring a new home, so I put her at the top of the cat tree and she settled in for a nap while Boo and Sam came up to watch the squirrels at the suet feeder. Trixie was tired enough that she just lay there and let the other cats sit inches away from her, so while it’s a very small start, it’s still a start.
After a while she was overwhelmed and came back to the guest room on her own, so I grabbed my laptop and came up with her, she’s asleep on my legs at the moment. She’s also taken to napping in the dog bed that I brought in from the bedroom, as you can see in the picture above.
Sorry Ellie.
Shortly after we adopted Trixie, I went to check on her before leaving for work and saw that she was tucked in under the blankets with her head on the pillow. I assumed my wife had done it before she left and grabbed my camera as I thought it made a cute picture, but it turns out Trixie did it all on her own.
Her confidence has grown by leaps and bounds since then so we started introducing her to the other pets this weekend. We started with our dog Ellie and that went well for the most part, but Ellie did snap her jaws at times if Trixie got close to her mouth, we’ll have to keep an eye on that. Our cat Sam is still a little unsure of his new sister but he did ask repeatedly to come into her room to meet her, the biggest problem is that Trixie introduces herself as “HEY SAM I’M TRIXIE LET’S PLAY PLAY PLAY!!!!!!”, while Sam would prefer some gentle nose-sniffing and a snuggle. Nevertheless Sam is coming around a little quicker than I expected.
Boo will be the hardest, we brought him in and he just sat in the corner and hissed and moaned. On the other hand, he sniffed Trixie when she was in the cat carrier today and didn’t seem upset, so perhaps that’s some progress. He still seems out of sorts, our sensitive little Boo, but he is still playful and above all, is eating normally.
Which is not true for little Trixie and that’s why she was in the cat carrier after an unexpected vet visit. She’s been throwing up and not eating much, although seemingly fine otherwise, so my wife took her in today. It’s unlikely to be anything alarming, probably just that her young stomach is adjusting to a change in her food plus the stress of her new life, but given what we’ve been through the past few months, it’s distressing just the same.
If she’s eating by tomorrow we’ll keep her on anti-nausea meds until she’s back to normal, but if not she’ll have to go in for more tests. These last few months have left me emotionally exhausted and I tend to fall asleep early on my couch every night, hopefully things will return to normal soon. I’d like a week where everyone is eating and no one is throwing up. We’ve been cat owners for over twenty years so it’s not like we’re new at this, but we haven’t had a run of illnesses like this before.
Thankfully Ellie has been healthy despite her advancing age, although even she gave us pause when a routine test suggested she had an infection. Thankfully a follow-up test showed she was fine and the first test was a false positive.
Boo is clearly on the mend, he’s eating his normal meals and was pretty playful tonight, Sam even got in on the action for a bit. They’re both still a little high strung, especially Boo, so when we start their introduction to Trixie we’ll take it slowly. Our dog Ellie met her tonight for a few minutes but we didn’t push it, Ellie was a little wound up.
This picture is from September 2013, when all the pets were cuddled up around me. Boo, having been accepted by the older cats, was sprawled out in my lap with his arms around me. Emma slept down by my feet with Sam using her as a pillow. Ellie was curled up beside me, you can see a couple of her paws at the edge of the frame. Laying quietly covered in pets, these are my happiest times.
Sam is curled up in my lap at the moment while Ellie is snoring in her dog bed. My wife is upstairs with Trixie, Boo I think is in one of the cat beds just around the corner. What joy these little creatures bring into our lives.
After Emma died early in January after a lengthy illness, and after Sam stopped eating a few weeks ago and after treatment only started eating just before we were going to have to start force feeding him, on Sunday Boo stopped eating. Normally he is food obsessed, and much like with Sam, had eaten normally in the morning but wouldn’t touch his food in the evening.
I walked down to the grocery store and got him some baby food as we did with the other cats, and thankfully knew from prior experience that Boo wouldn’t eat the beef variety that the other cats did, so got him turkey and chicken instead. He ate a jar later that night, and some baby food and cat food in the morning, but I was going to call the vet before I left for work to see what we should do, when he was able to eat another jar of baby food. If he was feeling stressed out, I didn’t want to add to that stress, so as long as he was eating enough and not showing other symptoms, we decided to just give him some time.
My wife thinks the the trigger may have been that I spent most of that afternoon with the new kitten, as I’ve been spending most of the time with the other pets while my wife hangs out with Trixie. Boo is a sensitive little fellow for sure and he’s had a rough month, but he had seemed like he was coping rather well.
Thankfully he’s back to eating his regular meals and while he’s not back to normal, this morning his energy levels were improving, although he’s still very unsure of himself. In another day or two I think he’ll be back to normal.
This picture is from the day after we adopted him in July of 2013 when he was in isolation in my wife’s office. He was terrified so I didn’t try for any pictures on the first day, but my new quieter camera arrived the next day and he was finally willing to come out of hiding at times, so I took a picture not long after unboxing the camera.
Trixie is still isolated in the guest bedroom and is doing great, we’ll start introducing her to our dog Ellie pretty soon, and then take it slow with the cats. We’ll keep a close eye on Sam and Boo given what they’ve just gone through, but I think they’ll be fine.
Okay then!
In truth her visit went fine, she charmed everyone she met. She just got a visual inspection this trip, in two weeks she’ll get some shots and then we’ll see a real test. She may be a bit older than initially thought, probably closer to six months than four or five, as she already has her adult teeth. It may be that she’s going to be a bit on the small side.
She was a bit unsure of herself when she got home so we gave her some time alone and soon enough she came out to play. Last night I laid down on the bed near her and she moved over and snuggled her face into mine. It was so adorable I could barely stand it.
She still has a bit of the sniffles but that seems to be getting better. Sam and Boo initially were very curious about the kitten on the other side of the door, Sam especially, but lately they’ve stopped trying to get in and are content to wait and see what happens. We’ll introduce our dog Ellie first since she should be the easiest, then give the cats brief introductions when we’re sure Trixie is up to it and her sneezing has stopped.
On the one hand I can’t wait for her to just be a part of the family, but on the other these early bonding moments are pretty special, as we see her start to understand that she’s home.
Our shy little Trixie is getting more and more comfortable with each passing day. This picture is from Thursday, two days after we adopted her. After playing a long game of string the tired kitten crawled into my lap, stretched out, and settled in for a nap. She’ll hide under the dresser behind her when she isn’t feeling so confident, such as after her first vet visit today, but for the most part she hangs out on the bed and plays or sleeps or snuggles. She’s starting to understand that this is her home, and so far, I’d say she likes it.
Our kitten has a name.
Tuesday night and throughout the day Wednesday, I made a list of every name I could think of for the newest member of our family, but none of the names felt right to both my wife and I. Thursday morning she sent me an email containing just one word: Trixie. It quickly became my frontrunner and within a couple of hours we both felt we had found her name.
She was thinking of girl detective Trixie Belden, but my first thought was of my favorite TV show from my childhood: Speed Racer. The adventures of young Speed, his girlfriend Trixie, his car the Mach 5, and the mysterious Racer X captured my imagination like nothing else until Star Wars (my wife nixed Leia early in the naming process). The revelation that Racer X, who was always looking out for Speed even at his own expense, was actually his older brother Rex was only eclipsed in my young life when the secret identity of Darth Vader was revealed.
I haven’t seen the show since those early days but from my memory not only was Trixie strong and independent, but the show to its credit didn’t diminish her as a woman for not being afraid to show that strength. I don’t know if I’m remembering her portrayal correctly but it’s why the name struck a chord with me. Our little Trixie was incredibly shy in her first day and mostly just wanted to hide under the dresser, but then rapidly started to conquer her fear and her playful, snuggly side emerged.
Trixie the young detective had blonde hair, while my hero Trixie was a brunette, so that too seems fitting given that our tortoiseshell kitten is a beautiful mix of both.
Welcome to our home, young Trixie, may you have a wonderful life.
Boolie 