Sally The Kitten

Living in town, there is an ordinance that prohibits people from letting their cats and dogs roam the neighborhood freely. However, some people pay no attention to the ordinance. It drives Chuck crazy when the these animals come into our yard and "do their business". And I must admit, it is aggravating to step in that mess in my own yard when I don't even have a dog.

Lately, the issue has been with cats. They get into our garage all hours of the day and night and make messes. Fed up with it, Chuck set some traps out to capture the perpetrators and turn them over to the town.

A couple days later, a cat got into the trap. The town was called and they picked up the animal.

Two days had passed. I went out to the garage to get some meat out of the freezer. The girls following right behind me. Shutting the freezer door I heard scratching coming from the overhead, makeshift shelves Chuck put up to store things.

"Shhhh." But Gracie and Suzie paid me no attention. "Hush you two."... scritch scratch. scritch scratch... "Great" I thought to myself, "that doesn't sound like a cat. That sounds like mice"... Yuck! those nasty little things crawling through my boxes of stuff...

I listened again..... faintly I heard a small, high pitched "meow"

"Girls! Be quiet!" I narrowed my eyes at the girls. Faintly again, "meow"

Caleb came through the garage door hollering, "Mom...." I shhh'd him too. "meow meow" scratch scratch.

I closed my eyes and sighed... Kittens! that's what she was doing in here. Baby kitties... "Caleb, bring that ladder over here"

I set up the ladder under the horizontal boards and climbed up. As soon as my view was up over the shelf, I saw two little fuzzy heads pop up over a box "meow meow"

"What is it, Mommy" the girls kept asking.

"Well" I smiled down at them, "Baby kittens"

Both girls squealed and jumped up and down, "We wanna see. We wanna see"

By this time, Josh came out to see what we were all doing. I handed down the kittens to Josh and Caleb. Four little fur balls. Gracie and Suzie were all over them, wanting to hold each one and showing no patience about it either.

Realizing the babies had been without food or water for two days, I sent Josh for a bowl of water and Caleb rode his bike to the store for canned cat food.... except he got Vienna sausage instead of cat food so he had to go back to the store- but that's another post...

The girls played with the kitties while I tried to get them to eat and drink. The boys got bored quickly and retreated to a game of basketball. I named the fattest one Bear- he was all black. I named the tri-color one Smudge- his coloring was all smudged together. Then I told each girl that they could name one.

"SouwLeey" Suzie uttered abruptly- so her kitten was named Sally. Gracie took her time and named her kitty "Stripey" but after Caleb suggested "Tiger" Gracie agreed to change her kitty's name.

Even though we had fun naming and playing with the kitties, I knew we wouldn't be keeping them. Surprisingly the girls didn't put up too much of an argument. "We'll find someone to take care of them" I consoled.

The next day the girls and I took the kittens to the "no-kill animal shelter" but they didn't have any room for more animals.... they never have room for animals because, well- they are a no- kill shelter... Just as we were leaving the parking lot, Angel called. She said she would take the kittens... she wanted some outside cats to keep the mice away...

So- Bear, Smudge, Tiger and Sally are all at Aunt Angel's. And every day Suzie asks if she can go see Souwleey, her kitty. And every time we go to Angel's, Suzie jumps from the van and runs to find her Souwleey. She sure loves 'Aminals'... as she calls them..