It's a Girl...We Think.

So, inaddition to moving, planning a wedding, and regular stuff Bill and I have officially become the foster parents of a 5-week old kitten. The kitten's momma got an infection and could no longer nurse her kittens, forcing her owners to disperse the kittens amongst friends. So, of course, my ever-compassionate friend, Sabrina, ended up with three kitties...Oso (black), Blanche/Samuel (tan), and Stumpy, aka Jeffri (grey).

Sabrina planned to keep Oso from the moment they fell in love, early in his life. Her brother had chosen Blanche/Samuel. Sabrina would have kept and loved the kitten they attectionately named Stumpy, but I offered my nurturing services. This kitten is the runt, significantly smaller than her brothers, shown above. Also, she was born with a nubbin-back leg. Imagine the pad of a cat's foot, but without toes. Just one soft, pink, wad-of-bubble gum. So, the kitten is on a regimen of bottle feeding every four hours, and at that point is also given some exercise, crawling and sliding all over the kitchen floor. Finally, I did change her name from Stumpy, which in her case was a totally appropriate name. But, I had always imagined having a nubbin-legged horse named Jeffrey. So, Jeffrey it was. However, upon closer inspection, Jeffrey turned out the be a girl! So, "ey" became "i", and we have a Jeffri (pronounced "jeffREE"). Here are some picture of her first night with us.

Of course, I do have some reservations. Most that I let myself recognize after we had brought Jeffri home. We have SO much to do. If unpacking, painting, cleaning and getting settled into a new house aren't daunting enough tasks, now I am dreading doing them with the added pressure of a 4 oz., crawling kitten. It will be a much more careful project now, which I guess we will try to do in the few weeks until she is still tiny, but wildly active. Also, I am allergic to some cats, which is part of the reason we are taking this on as a foster situation. If I turn out not to be able to handle her dander, than I know we will have to find her a home that can. Finally, our sweet but very nervous dog, Miles...We have no real idea how he will react. We have let them partake in some very supervised play time. (Like Jeffri in Bill's hands, and me holding Miles on the leash.) I am afraid to step back and see how Miles (half hound) will treat something that, at this point, is indistinguishable from a small squirrel, which naturally he loves to chase. It is a delicate balance, because, in some ways, now would be a great time to introduce Miles and Jeffri, because she is too young to run, so she won't trigger his chasing instincts. And, at the same time, she is so small that one little misstep and he could really hurt her. And, let's be honest, Miles is not the most patient of dogs.

Either way, I am looking at this as an opportunity to nurse Jeffri to health. I left out the "back" in "to health", because she never fell out of health - she is just small and young and needs as much love as possible!

The sign Bill made while I was out picking up Jeffri. :o)