Mia's Story

       

    Born:  Feb. 2014 ish

     Breed:  Mix Tabby

Mia, (a.k.a. Little Mia), kind of popped into our lives early on in the Spring of 2014.  One sunny afternoon I had just gotten home from work and had let our dogs out to run around and play in the backyard.  I usually end up checking on them every once in a while to make sure their not getting into any mischief. 

Well this one afternoon as I was checking on them I noticed one of our huskies Nala, running crazily around the backyard like she discovered the best thing in the world.  As she was running around like a fool, she then tossed something up in the air from her mouth and then caught it again.  I couldn't see what it was but I knew it wasn't one of the many dog toys that we have scattered throughout the yard.  So I decided to investigate.

No it was not Mia...  Here Nala, was playing/throwing up a little bird.  The bird was still alive when I reached it but it wouldn't fly away.  Knowing that I would be picking up my husband soon I decided to take it into the house, place it into a laundry basket with a towel draped over it and locked it in the bathroom till we returned home. The husband would then have to deal with it.  When I left the bird wasn't really moving and I figured he was most likely not going to make it.  But when I returned home and we walked into the bathroom it was up hopping around and chirping.   Good sign I guess.  We then took it back outside to see if it would fly away.  It hopped out of the basket and did it's best to fly but just hopped over to our Baby Blue Spruce Tree to hide and get away.  At this point I just looked at my husband and gave him a look as to tell him, "I don't know.. You figure something out".  As long as our dogs didn't eat or play with him to death, I didn't care.  So into the house I went.

A few minutes had passed and there was a knocked from our back door.  Figured my husband just locked himself out of the house again but as I approached the door and looked thru it's window, here was my husband holding this little kitten and a look on his face that said "Surprise!!".  Yeah, surprise alright.  Turned out after I went back into the house my husband managed to get the little bird out of the spruce tree but then it half hopped/flew underneath our shed.  So the husband bend down to see if he could see this little bird, but instead he found a little kitten.... And a few dead birds.. Ooops.  Apparently the little kitten came right over to him and started purring and once my husband handed her to me of course she loved me and started purring as well.  I told him we will keep her until we find her a home... She is still with us and her name is Mia :)  

Side note:  I don't really believe in this but my husband is convinced that Mia is the reincarnation of one of our deceased cats that was named Cookie.  

Which I may do a post on her someday because she was part of our crazy family and was one of the best cats EVER.  

Why my husband thinks this or if he is just saying it because it's eerie who know but when Cookie, passed away we buried her over near our shed.  Where Mia, was found.  

Mia, lays exactly how Cookie, use to with her two front paws tugged up underneath her.  

And finally she lays in the same spot in the house that Cookie, slept.  None of our other cats sleep there just Cookie/Mia.  Underneath the kitchen table on the right side cushioned chair..

 Coincidence or did Cookie, come back to join the party? LOL.

Belle's Story

Born Winter 2007

Black & White Siamese Mix

(We think)

When we first met Belle, she was actually named Bella, and belonged to my husbands cousin. Who lived with his then girlfriend and their little girl. I'm going to have to say the little girl was around 2 years of age and I hate to say it, but her parents in my opinion acted that age as well at times.. 

Now they had just moved to the same town as us and literally just a few streets over so we went to say hi.  The first time we were there the little girl of course had to show us everything, including the cat named Bella. 

The little girl would go and grab the cat by the tail and/or legs and drag the cat across the room and the poor cat just took it.  I know kids will be kids and be "ruff" till they know better but the parents didn't do or say anything just let the girl do whatever. It was hard to watch.  I know by reading this most people will be thinking oh it's nothing, the cat is fine yadda yadda. Honestly, the cat probably didn't know any better, growing up with that kind of torment and just, well took it.  It was sad.  

Back to the parents.  The little girls mother who had this Amy Winehouse, look going on was at the time taking classes to become a beautician (side note: she also claimed to do her own tattoos and offered us to have some work done.  We declined.) and was in the middle of learning how to dye hair.  Well she decided to dye Bella's white fur green.  So not only were they letting the little girl do whatever she wanted to the cat, why not practice dying hair on her as well.  

For the entire time, I felt so bad for this little cat, we would be sitting there and the little girl would go for her and we would say "you don't want to do that to the poor kitty, it's going to hurt her or don't bite the kitties ear, you wouldn't want someone to bite your ear. Would you?". Us, trying to step in for the parents who also would let their child eat out of the cats dish and they thought it to be funny.

As we were about to leave the cat was sitting in the open window next to the door so I decided to pick her up and to give her a little pat.  This is going to sound weird if not crazy but I can usually be-friend a cat/dog pretty quick and in the case of it being a cat, I can usually have a cat purring within a few minutes, if not seconds.  As I picked up Bella, for the first time she just went completely limp in my arms.  Didn't seem to care. No purring.  Nothing... :( 

We left. Leaving Bella, thinking about how she has to go thru her entire life thinking that is what life is all about. Yes, I know people, they are just animals, what do they know.  But I'm sorry, I think of animals as people.  They have feelings, they deserve to be treated with respect & kindness, and every bit of love that any decent person out there deserves. So F*** off. If you think I'm nuts for saying that, I really don't give a s***!

Well now, with that being said, lets move on :)

Within the following weeks my husband would go and stop in and say hi and come back telling me that the same thing was going on with the cat.  That the little girl wasn't understand the concept of being gentle.  Time passed by.  It was a few weeks before my husband and I were to be married and we had a little get together/bon fire at our house and there was an incident/questions that came up that really shouldn't of been asked by the woman.  Not sure if I mentioned this before but the man was my husbands cousin not the woman..  Questions that definitely DO NOT belong in this type of blog.  After that night I might of been questioning what I was marrying into... I'm kidding my husband.  Now we will see if he actually reads my posts. LOL. 

So I'm getting a little off track I know, but I feel this all belongs with Bella's/Belle's story.  Fast forward a few months.  My husband and I are now married.  We have moved to a different province.  We have 3 dogs & 2 cats.  My husband would check in with his cousin every now and then.  I'm thinking it's late October/November 2008 and it was a damp, windy, cold night and my husband gets a call from his cousin asking if we want Bella.  Because apparently him and his girlfriend (mother of his daughter) broke up, living apart, leaving him with the little girl and the cat. Now I guess he tolerated the cat for a little bit of time because it was his little girls, but he didn't want to deal with it anymore and said if we want her to come and get her or (makes me sick thinking about the following) he's going to do away with her.  I am not joking. I remember asking my husband, "is he serious?"...

1. How can a person "do away" with something that hasn't done anything wrong and 2. How the hell am I suppose to live with myself if we don't go and get her?  Yes please, I'd like to live with that on my conscience.  Again, I know people out there will be saying "it's just a cat" blah, blah. I don't care, I'm not built that way.

We hopped in the car, drove to the ferry, left the car on our side. Waited for the boat in damp, cold, windy weather with a cat carrier.  Walked onto the boat, took the 1Hr 15 min. crossing, met his cousin on the other side picked up Bella, walked right back onto the boat for the last crossing home and decided on the way home on the boat we both didn't really like the name Bella, but since we are both fans of Disney, Bella was to become Belle.

The newest member of our family.  Surprising, when we got home, I thought she'd be scared to death of all the other pets, but within 30 minutes she was out and about getting acquainted with everyone.  And I'm happy to say within a day I had her purring in my arms.

Belle loves her boxes.

Shiloh's Story

Born: Winter 2007

Tortoiseshell Cat

Shiloh has quite the story.  A little sad at first but she got a happy ending.

When we lived over in NS, my husband was overseeing the renovations of a Walmart, that was located an hour away.  Since most of the major reno. happened at night, that was when he would be working. These renovations were going on in Feb./March 2008 and every Friday, he would come home for the weekend, then I would drive him back on Sundays.  Now a few weeks into the renovations, one night a little kitten (few months old) made its way to the front of the store and pawed at the doors to try to get in.  My husband noticed the cat and since it was the start of the shift he took the cat and placed it in one of his co-workers Jeep till his shift was over (couldn't watch/ pay attention to a cat inside the store while he was working).  At the end of the night he took the cat, heading back to his hotel where the staff were quite taken to this little fur ball and her story of trying to get inside the Walmart to get warm. They agreed to let her stay in the room with him until he found it a home. 

Cue phone call to me...  Can we keep her?

At this time we had two dogs and one cat and I said no way.  No more.  That sure doesn't seem to stick when I say that:) It was a Wednesday when he called me, I would be going to pick him up the next day to take him home "without" a cat.  He kept insisting that she was friendly, small and just well adorable.  This coming from a guy who never thought he would be a cat person.  I still said no.

So the next day I travelled to the hotel and when I arrived around 2pm the room was pitch black, and my husband was half asleep so I asked, "so where's this cat?".  He lifted up the covers and here was the cat curled up asleep beside him. I went to go and pet her and she did one of her little meows and she got right up and came and curled up beside me.  Now come on!! Did you have to be that cute that fast?  

Later on came to find out her favourite things in the room were playing with/shredding the daily newspaper and also unravelling the toilet paper in the bathroom.  The hotel staff had also given her toys which were scattered throughout the room.  I forgot to mention this before, but what I usually ended up doing was I would drive up to the hotel on Thursdays, stay the night while my husband was at work then drive home in the morning. Before my husband left for the night he told me that if we weren't going to take her that one of the hotel staff had a cousin that was interested.  So that night I debated whether or not to keep her.  Now my husband claims my mind was made up that first moment I saw her. Which might/might not be the truth..... 

I named her Shiloh.

She still loves being under the covers.

P.S.  The morning before we heading home with Shiloh, my husband said that night they found a box of kittens that looked like Shiloh, left abandoned behind the store next to the dumpster.  I believe there were five kittens in total.  All boys.  Shiloh, was the only girl in the lot and the only smart one to travel to find better shelter/warmth.. Typical males. :)  Happy to say all were saved and taken to the local shelter where they found homes.

Fun Fact: "Cats of this coloration are believed to bring good luck in the folklore of many cultures.  In the United States, these are sometimes referred to as money cats."  We're still waiting for the "money" bit to kick in :p

Keira's Story: The Picture.

Keira

Siberian Husky

Born: November 13, 2007

The story of how we came to have Keira, starts with me simply looking thru an online classified site. I came across Keira's picture(shown below)and I just feel in love. LOL. I couldn't stop staring at her.  I know this probably sounds a bit strange but it's the truth.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I have always adored Siberian Huskies, and I kept telling myself.  One day I will have one.  

Back to the photo.  After seeing the ad, I never said anything. I just kept it to myself because well, we already had two dogs & two cats.  Oh and not to mention I was also getting married in less than a month. But I kept on coming back to "the picture". Debating in my head whether or not to bring it up with my fiancé/husband. So the next evening I replied back to the ad asking if the lady still had the husky for sale.  My thought was hey if she's already sold, she's already sold and that will be the end of it.  Do you ever get that feeling when you hit the send button on an email or message and your heart jumps up in your throat you kind of panic and you question what the hell you just did?  Well I got that feeling, plus add in some excitement and hope that she was still available. 

The reply came back. The lady said she still had the female husky who was 6 months old and her name was Keira.  Now that's another story as well.  I told myself that if I ever did get a Siberian Husky, and it was a female.  Guess what I would of named her?  Keira.  I swear to God.  She was perfect.  How could I not go and get her now?  But I still hesitated and waited.  Remember how I said I was just about to get married?  Well my fiancé kept trying to get me to pick something for him to get me for a wedding present.  I kept telling him your crazy, I didn't/don't need a wedding present. I'm not one for tradition, you got me wearing a dress, that's as close to tradition as your gonna get my friend.  So I finally caved in and said, well if you really want to get me a wedding present then well meet Keira.

Two days later we hopped into the car and drove 3 hours (each way) to meet Keira.  Keira was a little bit bigger than what she was in the first picture (something I will kind of regret. I never had her from a puppy), she was a little shy. Hmmm, remind your of anybody? The lady we got her from said she was a sweet little girl but she couldn't keep her, because she had another husky as well & two little kids and that was a bit too much. Oh and then came the fun...

The lady for some reason went to let the her other husky out in it's dog pen but when she opened the back door, off went Keira.  For two hours we tried to catch her.  The lady wasn't much help because she had to stay and watch her children so that left my fiancé and I. Two strangers trying to catch a born, bred runner. Yep, that was an experience.  Keira would come just close enough that you thought that you'd be able to catch her than then nope, off she went again.  Finally she got thirsty and went to her water dish.  Success! We said our goodbyes and we headed back along with her baby blanket & her little pink squeaky pig toy...

Keira had arrived :)

The 1st Picture

The Pets

Introducing

Our crazy pet family.

For more craziness please stay tuned..

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