Everything they do, they do it together. Play, eat, sleep, get into mischief.
They seem to believe that everything in the house exists simply for their amusement. Case in point. This morning I was getting ready to mop the floor. As I swept the floor, the kittens loved all the dust bunnies and pieces of cat food that got swept into little piles for them to scatter. After getting the floor swept, I got out the mop and my buckets, one filled with soapy water and one empty, ready for the dirty mop water. I can't carry everything in one trip so I set down my buckets and went to get the mop. On my return I found one bucket with soapy water and one formerly empty bucket containing a kitten. She watched me wring the mop out in the soapy water and couldn't resist jumping out of the bucket she'd been in to chase the mop around the room. I spent the rest of the time hoping she wouldn't jump back into the bucket she thought was empty and leave a mess in the kitchen. I have a lot of hard floors to mop and I went a bit slower than usual as I tried to avoid a kitten who thought it was great fun to chase the mop. Kitten footprints on my clean floors are an unavoidable part of life right now.
They will play with anything. It's a normal thing to walk into the kitchen and see the computer mouse hanging off the counter by it's cord thanks to a kitten. The shoelaces of shoes left lying around are gnawed on. They've completely destroyed my Halloween decorations, dismantling my big spider web, playing with the glittery plastic spiders until all their legs are gone and they've sucked off all the glitter! Any tiny thing like a pencil eraser, a ball of Styrofoam, and an ant are all fair game for getting batted around by a kitten.
Dode sits on the bottom stair each morning to tie his shoes. Since he wears work boots, his laces are three feet long. He often has a difficult time getting his shoes tied because each time he flops a lace over, a kitten attacks the end of it. He has to try to tie his shoe with a kitten hanging from the end of the laces!
They are also crazy for the laser pointer. They will spin in circles, race like fiends, all in pursuit of the green dot. If you aren't careful and run the dot up some one's leg, the kittens will follow right along. Ouch! What's funny is that although they seem totally wild and crazy when chasing the dot, they are perfect ladies who let each other take turns. While one is chasing the dot, the other waits patiently and watches until it gets close enough to her that the other kitten gives her a turn.
When they aren't hard at work playing with toys, they spend the bulk of their time playing together. Big time wrestling has nothing on two kittens. They each weigh less than five pounds but you can hear them thundering around the house. They'll run as fast as they can towards each other and launch into the air to collide together and hit the ground, a ball of legs and tails. It must be an exciting life when you never know when you'll be pounced on! One is often hiding in a crouch with tail flicking in anticipation waiting for the other to innocently walk by so they can pounce on them and tumble around.
Katniss goes in for the kill while Jules tries to defend herself from the floor.
The other morning it wasn't just each other they were wrestling with, it was me. Each time I'd walk down the hall, a kitten would run up and wrap her legs around mine in a hug and playfully bite my leg. She kept her claws sheathed but I wasn't so keen on the teeth!
They have to put up with A LOT around here! Miriam also dresses them in doll clothes.
Miriam is constantly toting one around. They're often carried around in a very precarious manner. William has shut them up in things, like the trundle bed on Miriam's doll crib, for hours (a behavior we're working hard to stop!) Then, every time they get used to a nice "quiet" house, Ramirez (my mom's dog) shows up to get them all riled up again!
This tent is for Miriam's dolls. The kittens have claimed it as their play house. You do NOT want to try to pet them when they are inside if you value your skin.
Kittens play hard and crash. Their favorite thing to do when they're not playing? Snuggling together and taking a snooze.
They made complete pests of themselves on produce morning. We were all out sorting produce into baskets when a kitten showed up. She was really riled up and it was difficult to catch her but I finally managed to and shut her back in the house. Pretty soon, she was back again. There had been some people going in and out the door and I thought maybe they'd snuck out. After the third time of them showing up and my chasing them around to catch them, I realized I was putting them inside the front door and they were going upstairs and getting outside through the open sliding glass door in my room. Smart kittens!
They were wild when we carried them home but now they seem to enjoy being around us. When we get up in the morning, they wake right up and greet us, blinking their sleepy eyes. When they hear someone come home, they also run over to see who it is. And, you can hardly sit at the computer without having a cat show up on your lap.
Are there drawbacks to kittens? Training them to use the litter box, cleaning out the litter box now that they've got it down, trying to teach them to not scratch the furniture, trying to keep the younger children from mauling them. Are there drawbacks to having two kittens? We put flea medicine on them the other day. You are supposed to apply it to the base of their skull so they can't lick it. They're such good friends to each other that they both got right to work, licking the nasty stuff of their sister. The medicine is very bitter to them and soon I had two kittens who were foaming at the mouth. I'd read the warnings on the box and knew that although it looks terrible, it is a side affect of them licking the flea medicine. We stuck them outside with a fresh bowl of water until they could get over their brush with looking like rabid cats. I hope they learned their lesson. I don't want them to have to go through that every month!
All of the children are absolutely enamored with the kittens. There is something strangely relaxing at having a little warm body purring in your lap while you run your hand over their soft fur.
The kittens have very different personalities. Jules is the brave kitten who is always investigating new things and is curious about the world. Katniss is our shy kitten who is hesitant about new things and takes a while to get brave enough to try out a new toy or head outside. You can even see it in their faces. Jules looking interested and scheming, Katniss looking hesitant and a bit frightened. What's funny is that when they're asleep, there personalities are reversed. Jules always sleeps curled up in a tiny ball while Katniss sleeps stretched out.
Dode says he doesn't see it as that strange. He says I'm the more outgoing one in our relationship but I sleep curled up and he sleeps stretched out. I'd never realized that before.
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