Kiki

Alan and I have never had much of a desire to have a pet, but the boys slowly wore us down.  He has been a huge animal lover since he was tiny.  Spencer has been asking for a dog for awhile now, but I couldn't quite make that commitment, at least not while we live in this tiny house. So, when a friend in town posted that she had kittens for sale, I started thinking that a kitty might be the perfect Christmas present for these boys.  I have fond memories of the pets my family had when I was a kid and liked the idea of a sort-of playmate for Mason and a bit more responsibility for Spencer.  Alan has never cared for cats and I had to work to convince him, but he eventually agreed.  :)

We decided that because of all of the vet and other expenses and kitten requires, that this kitty needed to be considered part of their Christmas even though we got her on Oct 15.  About a week before we picked her up, I purchased some supplies and wrapped them in Christmas wrapping to surprise Spencer.  (Mason had already been to see the kitties and was my confidant!)

 Excited to open presents:

"We're getting a cat." (No excitement in his voice)  Spencer was a little disappointed at first that we were getting a cat instead of a dog, but he likes Kiki now.

Spencer got the important job of naming her.  He used our old baby name books and came up with "Kiki."  It was perfect because that's already what it sounded like Mason was saying when he tried to say, "kitty."  Plus, it fits her crazy, little personality.

I felt so bad for Kiki the first day we brought her home.  She was less than two-months old (born Aug 20) and so small and cute.  She was terrified that first day and hid under a bookshelf for several hours.  It was sad to think how lonely she must be missing her mom and siblings.  Luckily, kittens adjust quickly and she was much more confident the next day.

We couldn't believe how much energy she had when attacking this ball on an elastic string.  Little did we know just how much energy she really had!

Because she was lonely, we thought it would be a good idea to have her sleep with Spencer that first night.  She curled up in his bed and went right to sleep.  I heard Spencer crying a couple of hours later though, and found him sitting in bed with scratched up legs.  Kiki had gone under his covers and attacked him.  He was slightly traumatized and Kiki has been banned from all bedrooms at night ever since.

Once Kiki warmed up to us, she would go crazy dashing around the house, jumping onto forbidden furniture, and play attacking us whenever possible.  Spastic is a good word to describe her.  It was taken a lot of squirt bottle sprays, light bops on the head, and time outs in the garage to calm her down a little.  She is still quite wild and we have issues with play biting, but will now be sweet and curl up in our laps occasionally.

"Robot!"

Even though Alan doesn't love her and getting pretty annoyed with her sometimes, he will occasionally let her sit in his lap.  :)

Mason has LOVED Kiki from the very beginning.  She is his best, little friend while Spencer is at school.  The main reason we wanted a kitten instead of a grown cat was because we wanted it to be friendly and good with kids.  Kiki is definitely that.  She plays rough, but lets Mason haul her around and give her kisses on the nose whenever he wants to.  She has never once tried to scratch or bite him because she didn't like what he was doing.

Vet visits have been surprisingly expensive.  Kiki is so wild that I can't clip her nails at home very often and have had to pay the vet to do that along with all of her immunizations.  :(  The vet recommended a "calming" cat food for her that contained tryptophan.  We tried it, but all it did was make her sleep more.  She was as crazy as ever when she was awake.

Here are a few funny things about Kiki:
-Her current favorite place to sleep is inside the box spring under Alan's and my mattress.  I don't know if there was a hole already in the bottom fabric or if she ripped one, but I find her in there frequently.  She also likes to curl up in this tiny basket on a shelf in our dining room and on the baby swing that's folded up under Mason's crib. 
-She likes to lay by the heat vents as much as Mason, Spencer, and I do.  Her favorite one is right below my kitchen sink so I'm always trying not to step on her when I'm doing dishes. 
-She LOVES to chase and wrestle pom poms, Spencer's stuffed moose, and the elves with jingle bells my Mom made for Christmas years ago.
-This isn't funny, but Kiki has been awesome with her little box.  There was only one accident the first day.
-She drinks leftover shower water out of our bathtub all the time and is fascinated by the water when Mason has a bath.  She feel in once and was not happy about it.

All in all, Kiki can be exasperating and is some work, but most of us love her and I think she was the perfect early Christmas present!

The Beginning of October

We watched the Sunday sessions of General Conference at Darwin and Debbie's house like usual.  Debbie was in Utah visiting Alicia so it wasn't quite the same, but the boys always love to go to "Grandma's house."  Conference was as inspiring as always and we ended the weekend with a turkey dinner at our house.

I caught Spencer with his glasses on!  He takes them to school, wears them when he can't read the board, and immediately takes them off again.  At home, he only wears them if he can't see the scores on a football game.  :)

I got to go on a field trip to Camp Tilikum in Newberg with Spencer!  Alan was working so Debbie agreed to watch Mason for the bulk of the day.  Thank you!  It was a rainy, muddy day at the camp, but we had a great time canoeing, seeing farm animals, going on a nature scavenger hunt, watching the other kids go on a big swing (I couldn't convince Spencer to try it.  He claims he's afraid of heights.), learning about what school was like 100 years ago in a one-room school house, and playing field games.  I'm glad that Spencer still thinks it's cool to have his mom go on field trips!

Mason thinks his "crazy hair" after his bath is hilarious.

Soaking up as much sunshine as possible while we could.  Spencer spends most of his time outside kicking a rubber ball into our roof and watching it bounce back down.