Patio Kittens.

This was a first for me out here; bottle feeding a litter of kittens. I’ve definitely supplemented, and brought new mommas inside during the winter to have their babies in the safety of the hallway, but mom is nowhere to be found in this case so these guys at about 3 weeks were ours to keep alive.

Thankfully I have had the assistance of my best girl ever, Miss Charlie. Charlie deserves this whole blog to be about her probably, so expect to hear more about her beautiful face, but for now, just knowing she was instrumental in caring for these squiggly squirmy wormies when they were still blind & unspeakably ugly will have to do.

There are five. We are still **ahem** “developing”, so we consult the knowledge of my wonderful friend and former vet tech whenever she comes to visit, but we think there are two girls and three boys. This is a developing part of the story, so check back later for updates.

This is Cheese. He usually has a cleaner face. He goes by Parcheesy from time to time.

This is Cheese’s twin, Chucky. Chucky is…different. He was the first one to receive a name because he is definitely put together all wrong, like maybe he stole someone else’s tail and ears and fur and attempted (poorly) to make them into his own individual, sentient, normal cat. He is maniacal and disheveled all of the time and he has violent tendencies. We also discovered yesterday that he may be a she? Inconclusive at this moment. We will be monitoring Chucky closely. 😬

This is Tighty-Whities. She was all white originally, but is developing some calico-esque bits on her face and tail, as you can see in the second photo.

This little one was the runt of the litter by far. Weighed half of what a couple others weighed when we initially took over, but has grown exponentially and is doing great. We’ve been unceremoniously just calling her The Runt all this time, and fortunately my kid recently announced her name was to be Violet. It’s a little too refined and elegant of a name in my opinion, but we agreed to try it out.

…and last but not least at all, the goofiest, largest, most uncoordinated, fluffiest class clown of all.

This is Kung Fu Panda Express.

KFPE is charismatic, bouncy, fearless, twice the size of everyone else, and is clearly the individual whom this whole situation revolves around. He may be an alien, because my mom and I both think he is a completely different age than the rest of the litter. For now, his origins remain unknown.

I am unclear about how to proceed, because these boys and girls are definitely destined to be barn kitties. (In other words, I have already completely met and very much exceeded the acceptable indoor cat population for my house.)

They are still quite small, and although my core group of barn kitties are really great caretakers and nurturers, and they have bonded pretty well with these five, there is really no replacement for having a protective and invested mom to look out for them and teach them barn cat etiquette.

Will they live on my porch for the entirety of their lives? Will they grow up to live productive lives? Will Chucky end up being a functional member of society or a public nuisance (or worse)??

I have no answers, but for now we are just keeping them warm, fed, & safe, and enjoying watching them grow up to cause havoc at all hours of the day and night.

Happy Wednesday! ✌️