My kids have been asking for a cat for a long time. My oldest, Mia, went so far as to bring home books about cats every library day last school year. When my neighbors went out of town Mia took care of their cat and she was so proud to share that she not only knew how to feed a cat, but also how to clean the litter box. The past few years they asked for donations for the local humane society in lieu of gifts and insisted on visiting with cats when dropping off the donations.
Our dog, Mookie, is getting old. He is a 15 year old puggle with arthritis, cataracts, and he’s got some hearing loss. He has a hard time keeping up with three lively kids ages 8 and 6. He can only go on short walks and doesn’t have the energy or the ability to play so he prefers to cuddle with them when they sit calmly. I know he is not long for this world and I get sad just thinking about it. We’ve had him for 12 of those 15 years.
The girls will be distraught because they’ve never known life without him and they love him so much. We thought perhaps having another pet will make the inevitable loss a little easier on them so my husband finally caved to their request or a cat.
It’s kitten season so the humane society is loaded with cats and kittens. So after a couple of visits to the local humane society we found a little 2 month old kitten that didn’t mind being picked up by little kids and likes to play. Her name at the humane society was Tots, but the girls wanted to change it to Ashley Pete. Ashley because she’s gray and ashes are gray, I’m not sure why they liked Pete, but it’s pretty cute.
When we brought Ashley home we took her out of the carrier with Mookie watching and took her upstairs to the bathroom. We let Mookie sniff her carrier and his tail was wagging the whole time. Ashley stayed in the bathroom until the next morning when we let her downstairs to explore. Mookie came downstairs a little while later and didn’t even notice her at first. When he did see her he was a little startled, but sniffed her and that was that. She followed him around the house and when he realized she stopped following him he looked for her. It was pretty cute.
I think everything is going to be fine between the dog and cat and boy are the girls happy. The smile on the girls faces makes my heart happy. I know that this kitten will get so much love and the girls are going to enjoy every second they get to play with her and snuggle with her.
My husband who was not so sold on getting a cat, but he is an animal lover, was alone in the bathroom playing with her and when I went in he said, “It makes me sad to think of all the other cats and kittens in the humane society waiting for good homes.” If you are thinking of adding a pet to your home please look into adopting from your local humane society. And be sure to spay and neuter your pets so more unwanted pets don’t end up in the shelters.
