This week my Wordless Wednesday documented a common sight in our house.  Mary James “loving on” one of the cats.

Annabelle is the cat receiving the baby pats.  She is the perfect kid-friendly-cat!  Anna-B is sweet as pie and more importantly she can’t hear a thing.  Yup, she’s your classic blue-eyed, white furred deaf kitty.

I told my husband we should totally breed Annabelle with another deaf white cat.  We’d have the perfect cats for kids!  Oh wait…just a slight problem…it’s completely UNETHICAL.  Oh well.

I do think Annabelle can hear some extraordinarily high pitched sounds.  Maybe.  She hasn’t had the BAER test (Brainstem Auditory Evoked Response) to know for sure what she can/cannot hear.  I was going to have her tested while I was in vet school.  But… A) There was no time and  B) She freaks out when she’s not at home.

And yes, she has recently been shaved/sheared.  I actually shave her myself.  Annabelle is not one for cleaning herself, and she tends to leave massive blobs of white fuzz everywhere.  Oh, and don’t you think she’s totally cute naked?!

As you can see by her elated expressions, Mary James totally LOVES the cats!  She babbles loudly at them and reaches to touch grab them.   And if they meow?  She kicks her little legs, pumps her arms, and squeals, like “Mom this is the bestest toy EVER!”

I hope this trend of calm kitties and one thrilled baby continues.  Hopefully, we won’t use up the kitties’ patience!

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I’m in the bathroom last night getting ready for bed, and noticed this:

A calendar that has been frozen in time on August 27, 2008.  Don’t ask me why that poor dog has on such a tacky pink outfit, it’s a crazy pet calendar. That night around two-ish I started having contractions, and by 11:50 am August 28 my sweet baby girl was in my arms.  It’s a poignant and perhaps corny reminder of how much everything that has changed since that night, three months ago.  Or it just points out that I’m so out of it, I can’t even remember to rip off the pages to the right date. Nah.

Although, all the changes haven’t been completely smooth (no sleep), overall its been better.  So much better than I could have ever imagined.  It’s definitely made me a little more relaxed.

-I showed up to Thanksgiving lunch with no socks on (not on purpose)…and guess what?  I didn’t care.

-I forgot to put on nursing pads a few weeks ago, and ended up completely drenched at my in-laws.  Embarassing?  Totally.  But I didn’t freak (unlike my former self).

-I even forget stuff at the store, frustating yes, but it sort of makes me feel normal.

-And strict schedules?  Forget it.  No, I’m not talking about being punctual, just knowing what is happening next.  I’ve been obsessed with schedules since I was little.  Mom said I would harass them on vacation about “What’s next?  And after that?  And then what?”  To which the response was always, “WE ARE ON VACATION ERIN!”

Well, now Mary James makes the schedule.  And I’m okay with that.  Most of the time.

The only way I can describe it, is that it sort of feels like Christmas morning.  EVERY morning.  I wake up, think of my baby girl, and can’t wait to go pick her up and kiss her.  I would be lying if I said it was easy and fun all the time, but it is totally WORTH IT.  And I hear it just gets better and better.  Thank you God for our little blessing.

Man there are a ton of cat litter choices out there!  Choosing a litter at a pet store has become a daunting task.  Clumping or not?  Crystals?  Perfumed or no?  Litter that changes color?    My cats are not terribly picky when it comes to litter so I’ve tried a few to see what worked best for all of us.  From cleaning, to smell, texture (a big thing for many cats) and clumpability.  The following is my personal experience with a variety of cat litter — what worked (and failed) for me, may not work with your cat — but it might save you some money from trying the multitudes of litter out there.

1) Plain clay litter (non-clumping)

This litter is usually very dusty (I’ll admit some clumping litter can be dusty but not quite as bad in my experience).  Because the litter doesn’t clump it makes it difficult to clean out urine.  The urine usually settles in the bottom of the pan and you end up scraping out a ton of clean litter with the soiled litter.  However, some cats prefer the texture of clay litter on their toesies — you just have to know your cat.

2) Tidy Cat

I have used the regular, multi cat, immediate odor control, and long lasting odor control formulas.  This litter clumps okay but seems to break apart easily when you are scooping it.  It also seems to stick to the bottom of the box and become a concrete like paste, that’s nearly impossible to scrape out.

3) Tidy Cat Small Spaces

Compared to regular tidy cat the “small space” formula is at least $2-3 more for the same amount of litter.  It does seem to do pretty well on covering smells, but the clumps still break apart and again it turns to the grey paste in the corner of the box.  It also has a strong perfume odor, so if your cat doesn’t like perfumed litter (and alot cats don’t) this is not the litter for you.

4) Arm and Hammer Litter

I haven’t used this litter in a couple of years so I admit I’m a little hazy on it.  From what I remember, it took care of litterbox smells pretty well, but didn’t clump all that well.

5) Feline Pine

This litter looks like small sticks (kinda like pretzel sticks).  It dissolves, when it gets wet, into a saw-dust like material.  My main complaints about this litter is the smell — it smells like a pine tree (duh!) and then when you add urine and feces you get a funky litrine+forest smell.  Mmm…reminds me of Girl Scouts!  Not to mention alot of cats do NOT like loud smelling litter — its sort of a litterbox turn off.

Also, my cat seemed to collect the saw dust like particles in between her pads and then deposited them throughout the house.

On good notes, the litter is virtually dust free, contains no added chemicals or artificial fragrances.

6) Crystal litter

This litter basically dehydrates the urine.  However, to do its “magic” the litter makes a slight hissing sound when urine hits it.  As most cats don’t think hissing = happiness, many cats will not use this litter.  I guess its sort of like little kids and automatic flush toilets — they think the toilet is going to suck them in.  So I guess cats think the litter is angry at them.

7) Fresh Step UNSCENTED

I LOVE THIS LITTER!  The clumping factor of this litter is excellent and I love that it is unscented.  My cats seem to like how it feels on their toes.  It also controls litter box smells pretty well (hey…no litter is perfect).

Helpful Hint:

Ben gets the credit for this one:  If you have a deep enough litterbox, put about 5 inches of litter in the box.  This seems like a huge amount (its about 1 box of litter).  However,  it makes it so the urine clumps on top instead of allowing it to flow to the bottom, and then soak in the plastic.  It makes cleaning out the litterbox much easier and it gives the cat more litter to paw through.  (That’s if you have a kitty that actually covers their poop — must be nice!)

Cats aren’t supposed to like water…right?  Well, Annabelle loves it.   I mean she doesn’t exactly love baths, the whole getting soapy, and soaking her entire body with water pisses her off.  But she never tries to retaliate (no vicious bites or nasty claws), she just shrieks through the entire bath.

Back to the water loving portion of Anna’s personality.  As a kitten, she always sat on the edge of the tub while anyone took a shower.  There’s something creepy about a cat watching you shower, I know she’s just a cat but its still weird.   I mean what’s going on in her little kitty brain…  mmm… WATER…..   The minute you turned off the water she would leap into the tub, to catch any fleeting drips from the faucet.  Well, the drips weren’t all that “fleeting” as we lived in a apartment building from the 1920′s.  Point: she would end up sopping wet pretty much every day.

When Ben and I got married, our first house had a shower w/ a glass door, which severely hampered Annabelle’s watering hole habits.  However, we did have a garden tub to satisfy her drippy water addiction.  She quickly learned she could beg at the garden tub faucet for the water to be turned on.

I ask myself now WHY DID I GIVE IN?  Well for one she is so darn cute…and frigging annoying w/ the howling! I also rationalized that she was deaf, so if drippy water was something she enjoyed she should have it since she can’t hear the world around her.  I know, bleeding heart, blah, blah, she’s just a cat.

We tried to wean her from the habit, and we’re doing great until we visited my parents, who also have a cat who loves a leaky faucet.  Oh well.

Anna has now been begging for water from faucets for 5 years.

In our new house, she not only begs in the bathroom, but now she has discovered the motherload…the laundry room faucet.  This most recent find in her quest for the silver wonder that gives her the glorious water is located next to the kitchen and within sight of the living room.  She can simply poke her head around the corner of the door and howl at us.  FANTABULOUS!

I can’t remember the last time I actually turned on the water, so I guess Anna deserves the perserverance award.  I just hope she doesn’t learn how to turn on the faucet…oh boy!

The summer before my senior year of college my roommate and I decided we needed a kitten, like we needed a hole in our heads.  But so began our search for the perfect apartment cat.  I called my fiance, Ben, to tell him we were going to look at kittens at the shelter, and to see if he had any suggestions as this whiskered baby would be his in a year.  He laughed and said “YOU…just LOOK at kittens…yeah right Erin. <smile> Just don’t get one with long hair and NO WHITE CATS.”

The animal shelter was loud with crying puppies and mewling kittens, oh and that funky perfume of pee and poop.  Definitely not the best kept shelter, and no I’m not bashing all animal shelters I know its a very stressful place to work/volunteer (I’ve done that), BUT it is possible to keep them decently clean.

In the kitten room, I was overwhelmed by all the kittens — i wanted to squish them all! (translation: hug, pet, kiss, etc.)  You know when you see a cute fuzzy animal and you want to pick them up squeeze them till they meow?  No?  Oh well.

I was drawn to a teensy, WHITE puffball with ice blue eyes.  She was very lovey, but definitely in her own world and seemed to jump a little when you picked her up from the back.  Now what were those rules Ben gave me…something about white?  As we exited, a volunteer hollered out “By the way, we think she’s deaf someone’s already returned her once.”  Hmmm…

So began life with Annabelle.

The first week home, it became clear we were going to have to “watch out” for this kitten.  Her second day home I stepped on her coming off the bed from changing a light bulb. She never heard me coming.  This was a not a little squish but a full arch plant with all my weight. I screamed, she pooped, but all was well.

HER MEOW.  Now I know all cats have different voices but at least they have a volume control.  Anna is a screamer and sometimes a wailer. Her meow wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t SO frigging loud. For example:

<Knock> on the apartment door.

Neighbor:  Hey, I was just checking to see if your cat was okay.  I heard a horrible howling and wanted to come check.

Me: <pick up Anna> Yeah, she’s fine.  She’s deaf and can’t hear herself, so volume control is kind of non-existent. Sorry. <sheepish shrug>

We “tested” her hearing by using a very advanced system of an alarm clock next to her head while she was sleeping…no response.  And for southern testing sophistication, my dad fired his shotgun in the backyard while Anna slept on the screen porch — with again no response from wee sleepy kitten.  Man you gotta love the South!

So, it was official.  Annabelle was deaf.  Destined for a life indoors with lots of love!