#25 The Gaze

Allyson shot this great photo of Boots, the momma to our kittens. In the actual print, her fur looks like it comes right off the paper, almost as if you can reach out and touch it. She's looking off in the distance, probably doing a bit of bird watching. :)

We've also seen something very interesting lately. A couple of nights, we saw a cat we THOUGHT was Boots, but something didn't seem right - the face looked different. The kids got a video of it on the porch playing with the kittens one night, and when the cat saw them at the window, it ran off. Boots would come right up to the window. I told them it was probably Boots, and they just startled her. They *insisted* it was a different cat.

Well, this morning, they were proved right. When I opened the curtains, Boots was laying right in front of the window on the table. I saw Niko take off across the porch - playing with what I assumed was one of the other kittens. A moment later, this full grown cat came running across the porch with Niko. It stopped right in front of the window. It's NOT Boots (who was still on the table). But it looks just like her, only it doesn't have that little bit of white striping as far up the center of the nose as Boots has. It's a tad bigger than Boots, but otherwise the rest of the markings are the same. And it's eyes are not as big of round as Bootsie's.

So it's official - we have another cat visiting, and it's obviously a cat Boots is okay with as she doesn't fight with it and allows it to play with the kittens. Perhaps it's Bootsie's mother? Grandmother came to visit her grand-kittens? When I go outside, it runs off. But it comes back at night sometimes.


Here's a few more photos I'd like to share. The first one is Max and Boots on the porch. Looks like she's having a talk with him..."Hey Boy, you see that cat food? Now I want you to keep your big ole nose away from it. It's mine....all MINE!"

And the final photo - Lady, the matron of the house. What a look she has going on..."I used to be the only one...then you brought in an indoor cat and this puppy that grew twice my size and pushes me around. Then you adopted this outdoor cat, who has since had kittens, so there's MORE for me to keep up with. My God, what happened to simplifying life? UGH!" :)


P.S. Check out the new kitty wrestling slideshow on the bottom of the blog!