Saturday 6th May
Well, Tari left us yesterday. We went out almost as soon as she had gone, the idea being to take my mind off things. Which worked pretty well, until I got home, and there was one little brown face missing amongst the clan! As they were in the conservatory, they all ran to the door, ( being glass they could see us), making actually getting in something of a problem! Fluffy and Spotty were the worst! And Gollum come to think of it.

I did miss my little chocolate girl last night, but now I have to prepare myself for the departure of Spotty and Mini, who are leaving us tomorrow. I have decided that I am not very good at this part!

I think the sun must have worn them out yesterday, because at midnight, they were still all sleep! In fact, they are all asleep now! The past few days they have been so lively, they are obviously catching up on their sleep after all that wakefulness! Having the run of the conservatory definitely seems a popular move. They have enjoyed the sunshine and the extra space, especially as it was so warm yesterday. I took a photo of a heap of them on my table. With them all out there, using the table was impossible. They had managed to knock most of the paperwork off, so I had to move it elsewhere. The table cloth became something to sleep on! So I moved some of their vet bedding through, to give them more comfort,

They are 13 weeks tomorrow, so after tomorrow, I will start to ease off on the diaries, running down to next weekend, when my final babies will move onto their new homes. I am not looking forward to the quiet in the house when they have left, although some sleep is going to be very welcome!!

I have just had a message from Liz, Tari's new mummy. It sounds as if she has been a good girl, and is settling in well. I will look forward to the photos, and post some when they are ready. Thank you Liz, for looking after her so well for me, I know that she is going to be very very happy living with you.

Friday 5th May
This will only be a short entry for today. Tari is going to her new home later on today, so I have been trying to make sure that I have everything ready for her. Her travel basket it ready, complete with blanket that has lots of hair and fur from all her buddies here, so it will smell comforting for her. The basket has also been well used, so she will be familiar with it. I am feeling the normal mix of emotions at this stage. Excitement for the new family that she is going home with, and that little knot inside, that tells me that I am going to miss her!! I have always been brave so far, and kept smiling throughout the whole process!!

The cats and kittens have all been in the conservatory for most of the morning, occasionally coming in her, to have a shout at me, a purr and then going back. It is so warm in there at the moment, that they don't want to come out. Spotty is making it very hard going outside, as she is waiting to escape into the garden, as if Fluffy!!! They all looked very bemused as they watched me put the bunny into her outdoor run. They are funny. Lots of little white bodies, running around, often as a group, which gives the resemblance of a school of fish sometimes!!

When I drove back, after dropping the boys off at school, I had to smile with pride, as I saw a few of my babies sitting on the windowsill in this room. They look so beautiful from the outside. I am at the bottom of a cul de sac here, so not many people will see them sitting there, but I feel really proud when I do. I think, 'those are my babies, and after all that hard work, they have grown to be very beautiful'.

Percy has declined to come into the house. The weather is beautiful and he prefers the peace of the garden, to the onslaught of curiosity he would get if he walked into the conservatory!!! I will let him in later, when I shut the little ones out of there. I did offer to let him jump in through the lounge window, while I was having a clean, but he declined. There were no 'white things' in there, but the sun was glorious outside.

I will sign off now, as I still have lots of things to do. I must activate Spotty's free insurance cover for Sunday, tidy myself up, check the litter trays and then go to tesco's to buy some more fish, chicken and beef for the little ones ( or in Fluffy's case, not so little!!!).

The photographs may have to wait, as I do not think I am going to have time to sort them out now. Maybe I will do them tonight so that they can be on line for tomorrow.

Thursday 4th May
Well, the sun is shining now, it is lovely and warm, my conservatory is now a much nice place to inhabit, and bunny is outside. So I have let all the kittens into their, and they are happily wrecking anything that is possible to wreck. The bonus of this, is that they are not wrecking the rest of the house! From where I am sitting, I can just hear lots of sounds, of kittens and cats leaping on things, and the odd bang here and there!!!

I let them in late in the afternoon yesterday, and I took a few photos of them. I will post them on here later on today. But you can see them all invading my table, playing havoc with my meagre attempt at a table cloth, and generally enjoying the sunshine.

The down side of them being in there, means it is hellishly difficult to get in and out of the house!!! The front door is barricaded by the scratching post still, and every time I go near the door in the conservatory, I have lots of little faces, eager to make a bolt for it. This means invariably, that I have to remove them from the room, in order to use the door, clean out litter trays etc.

Tim has been trying to help out here, only he has not quite grasped the fact, that in order to start moving them, you have to close the kitchen door behind you. He happily carries out one kitten, puts it in the hallway, and goes back for another. In the meantime, the first kitten has legged it back into the conservatory!!!! Bless him, I think he is beginning to realise now how to do the job effectively!!

I was hoovering the conservatory this morning, and stumbled across an idea, that just firing up the hoover is guaranteed to send them scarpering into other parts of the house!!!!

I weighed the smaller 3 last night, and was delighted to see that they had all put on quite a bit of weight. Operation, feed tiddlers beef, seems to have paid off!!! Little Mini is running around with a round belly now, LOL. With Jasmin, I just put a handful of the little biscuits she likes, close to her, when she is settling down, and she usually eats a fair few of them. The problem with Gollum, is to slow down his eating!!!!!!!!! As for Fluffy, from Lily's litter.......when these babies start to leave me, she needs to slim down a tad!!!! I think she and Gollum are competing to see who can get the largest belly!!!

Anyway, I am now going to take some rest. I was not very successful yesterday. As I lay down in here, they all decided to use me as a play area ........Gollum and Tari being the worst offenders!! Fluffy just decided to sit on me, so that I could not move around. In the end, I dozed off, and woke to find all by Lily and Spotty ( who were on my bed) snuggled up to me. That was nice.

I will post the photos a little later today again, and my eyes are drooping ( unfortunately the kittens are showing no signs of slowing down!!!!).

Wednesday 3rd May
Last night, I left out,
1 plate of freshly cooked thin beef steak
2 plates of cooked cod
2 plates of cooked chicken
1 bowl of wet cat food
small dish of liquivite
1 plate of finely chopped cold sliced chicken and beef
various bowls of dry biscuit, between upstairs and downstairs.

When I got up this morning ( bear in mind, this was midnight that I left it all out) at 6.30am, every single plate and bowl had been licked clean!!!!!! There were still plenty of biscuits, but the rest of it had been devoured.

This gave me two feelings. The first was an inward groan, that I had to go to the kitchen, in my half asleep state, and start the cooking and feeding all over again, but also, happiness that they were all eating well ( better than us often!!!).

Fortunately they were all running about upstairs, so I was able to go about my duties without being tripped up in the process. I knew this was the first meal of the day, and I knew that when I came back from the school run, I would have to put down their second course. They tend to eat heaps in the morning, and over night, and then have their long sleep around the middle of the day, where they eat very little. This is quite useful if I need to go out.

Gollum, eats anything and everything! The vet was very impressed with him yesterday. My darling looks like he may be needing a new home, as the home he was going to seems to have stumbled across a problem.

Tari will eat anything and everything also, bless her. She is going to her new home on Friday, so there is not very much time left. We shall miss her, as she is such an easy kitten to have here with us, but I know just how spoilt she is going to be in her new home, she has lots of love waiting for her.

Mini Choc, well bless her. She will always be a small cat, but she is eating Beef and Chicken, which is good for her. And she is leaving us on Sunday now, she is going to join Auntie Spotty, living with some lovely friends of mine (Spotty is going on Sunday at the same time). I know this is lovely for little Mini, and lovely for Spotty, as she can mother her and take care of her. And I know there is heaps of love waiting for the both of them.

Jasmin, bless her. She is a small wee girl, with a very loud voice and a very loud purr. She is a tad fussy, probably the fussiest now. She will eat ( well, this is when I am watching) only the Royal Canin Baby cat biscuits. This is a problem, because they are a bit rich for Lily, so I try to put them in places Lil does not usually go, or make sure I supervise jasmin eating them. She likes some liquivite also. she does ( she has just come into the room, looking for mischief, and her little motor is purring as she climbs onto my arm, making it near impossible to type ) eat other biscuits from time to time. She is going to her lovely new home, a week on Sunday, and I know how much she is wanted and going to be loved.

And little Cari, well it looks like she has drawn the short straw, and is staying here with us. With 3 Caramel Tabby girls in the household, I can see me getting mega confused this time next year!!!!!

They are all starting to settle down now, so I am going to take my leave, and have a little sleep for a while. The photos will be posted later on in the day time, as I really feel tired now. Hopefully the ones that I have taken will come out well.

Tuesday 2nd May
I know that Spotty is one of Lily's babies, but she managed a first yesterday. The children go up in the loft, to build and play with their war hammer. There is a ladder left down, so that they can go up and down. Well, I heard a shout from in the loft, telling me that Spotty was up there, and could I come and get her down quickly!!! Little monkey. She had obviously got onto the banisters and then made her way up the rest of the ladder.

The beef is still going down well!!! All the kittens really like it, in fact they cannot get enough of it, that is, apart from Jasmin! I am tending to take her aside and give her biscuits separate, so I can check what she is eating, at least a few times each day. I am also monitoring how much Mini Choc is eating. Cari seems to have become better at eating, so I am not worrying about her quite so much. Gollum and Tari are just BIG so I know they are eating enough!!!

I am off to the vets soon, as it is 2nd vaccination time. I have to confess that I really do not like doing this, I feel so rotten for them!! They are all snuggled up in the hallway, on the scratching post, in the sun, and at 10am, I am going to have to disturb them, put them all in the basket and whisk them off. I will take G with me this time, as she needs her vaccinations too. This means the basket will be heavy to carry!!!

The photos that I have taken, I took last night before I went to bed. I managed to get a couple, of all G's litter, together on the bed settee. I though this was a good one to take, a bit like a school photo before they all leave school. Tari leaves us on Friday, only a few days away now. I am very tired, and I really do need a rest, but I am really, really going to miss having my house full of little terrors. Thank goodness I shall be keeping 2 of them here! Percy may think otherwise though!!!!

Well, vets visit over, thankfully!!!! I feel very tired now though!! Trying to get them in the basket in the first place was a trial, as they had just woken up and they were very lively!!!! No sooner had I tried to put one in, than another would escape. Anyhow, we got there in the end, and there was rather a lot of cursing from the kittens in the car. I put Gollum and Tari in a separate travel basket, being the larges of the bunch. They protested quite loudly, Gollum the most!! I put the other 3, in with G. Mini and Cari were not too bad, but little Jasmin, what she lacks in size, she makes up in vocal volume!!! She was definitely trying to fight her way out, for a little girl, she has a lot of spirit!!!

They all wanted to get out of the basket, meet the vet, and, given half a chance, explore the entirety of the surgery. One thing that I can safely say, is that my babies are NOT afraid of the vets!! I think they see it as a jolly outing!

Anyhow, they are all sleeping now, so I will sign off for now, as I am deserving a much needed sit down!!

Monday 1st May
I did not submit an entry yesterday, as I went out for the day to watch the football. The kittens were well looked after while I was out, but it was nice to have a warm welcome when I came home.

I enjoyed the evening, sitting watching Miss Marple, with all the cats and kittens keeping me company. There is something very soothing having so many cats around you for company.

The beef is still being a very popular food!!! They have got through huge quantities since I have been cooking it for them! Little Mini likes her beef, Jasmin is not quite so sure about all this food, a good bowl of biscuits and some liquivite is still her favourite. Cari is becoming less fussy now, and eats quite a lot of chicken. She, unlike Jasmin, does not really eat any biscuits.

Tari and Gollum, really don't mind, as long as it is food!!!

I did not get up very early this morning, and I was privileged to have cuddle with Gollum. He has just come to join me out here, and I cannot resist picking his warm little body up and giving it a cuddle!! I love to cuddle them and to kiss their warm, furry little tummies!!!

I have just taken a photo of each of them, as they were 5 minutes ago. Most of them are asleep, apart from Gollum and G, who are now eating ( again!!!). The sleeping ones are being lulled into sleep by Queen, whom my boys are listening to!!

Saturday 29th April
It is now getting on for half past midnight on Friday night. I am just sitting down here, slowing down, waiting for the cats to settle. All seems to be going quiet, which is good, because I really do not feel quite like cleaning out any more litter trays, of filling up any more food bowls! Tonight I have been a conveyor belt of litter trays, cuddles, chef, mum to my 2 legged ones, and generally trying to keep everyone happy. As I have mentioned before, I like to make sure everyone is settled, and well fed, before I go to bed, as the wee ones have to contend with the likes of Fluffy, who lives for her food and her belly!!! And of course L and G. As long as I have seen the smaller ones eat, then I relax, but I like to think that there is enough here, when I go to bed, for them to have during the night, when they wake up. Although I have begun to realise, that the hours I am actually asleep during the night, are not very long, so they really do not have to wait that long for breakfast!!!

At 23:30 tonight, I found myself cooking some thin slices of beef in the microwave!!! This was an indication that my social life really had disappeared and that my priorities were well and truly established!!!

All the little ones, are upstairs asleep somewhere, with G. Fluffy and Spotty are down here together, and Lily is cuddled up to my knee, purring, and giving me that needed comfort.

Lily is a beautiful cat, and I see her as my 'Oak Tree', because from her, many beautiful little lives have blossomed. You have to live with Lily, to really appreciate her inner beauty. And her many wonderful qualities have been spread out to her children and her grandchildren. Razzle would have been very proud of her.

Everything is quiet now…..so I will go to bed in a minute.

I took some photos tonight. The little ones were in the conservatory, and Percy wanted in also. They are getting better with one another, and Percy is such a gentle giant, bless him. Our lives were truly blessed the day he wandered, abandoned into our garden. But dear Mini Choc, made me laugh, as she tried very hard to fluff up her tail, LOL, but she is a wee thing, and there was not too much to fluff up!!! I took a couple of photos, although they were not the best.

Also, some of the braver ones, are now leaping onto the banisters, despite my best attempts to barricade them off. I took a photo of Tari, while on them, before I lifted her off, and told her that it was a much too dangerous place to be!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Friday 28th April
Well, apologies for a lack of entry yesterday. I have been feeling a bit under the weather again, so I needed a good sleep in the morning, with the cats, and by the time I had woken up, I was suddenly rushing to sort everything out for them! They have been quiet all morning, up until now. So when I got in from taking the children to school, I snuggled up again, although this time not with the cats, as they were asleep in various parts of the house, and I could not squeeze into their rustle tunnel, or under my dressing table amongst the teddies! They stayed quiet for as long as I slept, and then as soon as they heard me get up, they all woke up, so the ritual of filling up food bowls started again. I have calculate that while they are here with me, I am putting down about 3 meal replacements in the morning, then they have the long afternoon / early evening sleep, and then we go back to the 3 meal replacements again. I say meal replacements, because I put food down, they hoover it up, I put more down, to make sure the smaller ones always have access to food, and they hoover it up again, and so it goes on!!! I am getting through silly amounts of chicken, ham, cold beef, liquvite ( a couple of them like a drink of that), some wet 'cat food', and of course the biscuits.

Gollum has just come into the room, and crawled up behind me and purred very loudly in my ear, I am going to miss this little fellow when he goes!!!

The little ones from G are just sooooo purry, they have the loudest purrs that I have ever heard in a kitten, Jasmin probably having the loudest, and Cari having the most instantaneous! Cari really reminds me of her mother when she was her age. They are all now currently upstairs, wrecking something, somewhere!!!!! But it is that time of day, so it wont be long before they flake out for a good 4 hours.

It is only a week now before Tari leaves us for her new home!!! They will be 12 weeks on Sunday, this is hardly credible really. In just over 10 days time, there will be only 4 kittens in the house, and I will no longer be writing diaries! I have been writing them since 28/12/05 and it feels like forever!!

I am really going to miss them when they leave, as the house will feel so empty, but as we are keeping 2 here, it wont feel as if everyone has gone. My bin men will certainly be happier! Last Monday, we had had to go without a bin collection, due to Bank Holidays. Well, I had to leave rather a lot of extra, due to cat litter, and I could hear them cursing about the weight! I was a tad embarrassed so I hid inside! I have been trying to recycle as much as I can, in the sense that it is wood chip, and I use my compost bin for some. But my compost bin is also only so large, and my garden is not big enough to dig it all in. So the poor bin men have to bear the weight sometimes!

I took a few photos last night, so I will have to go and change computers now, as this machine does not like my camera software!!! and hopefully there will be a couple of good ones.

Wednesday 26th April
It is half past midnight, and while I sit on my bed and drink my green tea, in the dim light, it is always a good time to reflect over the things that the kittens have been doing. It is also a good thing that I can touch type as I cannot see the keyboard!!!

I did laugh at them a few minutes ago. I had just finished the pre bed time litter tray clear our, which involves emptying them, spraying them with animal safe anti bacterial spray, and refilling them. The cats love this at night time, as I tend to be lazy and do the emptying in the kitchen, so they like to leap on the tesco's bag full of cat litter, as I try to take it out!!! Anyhow, I had just finished doing all this, and come upstairs to sort myself out for sleep. I go downstairs to find a large amount of kittens, who have managed to de roll the kitchen roll, and are attacking it all over the kitchen floor…….they also have my bag that has the cotton wool in it, and they are dismembering that also over the kitchen floor!!!!! Bless them. They looked peeved when I shut them out of the kitchen, shut them out of the spare front room, I have to minimise the damage during the night!!! And then try to get into my room before sleep. I do have to allow myself about 6 hours cat and kitten free sleep, other wise I would not function at all in the day time!! As it is, I usually collapse at some point to have a sleep, usually when they are all asleep and the children are at school.

I have left them their usual banquet downstairs, so they can have their usual midnight feast, although it has all gone very quiet, so I suspect they have gone to sleep now. They do that when I go to bed, bless them. Then at about 5 in the morning they wake up, ravenous, so I like to think they have enough to keep all of them happy. They currently have various types of chicken, a little bit of ham, some liquivite in a bowl, as Jasmin is very partial to it, biscuits, and some Sheba, Salmon in Jelly, mixed with Royal Canin for sensitive tummies, this makes the Sheba a little less Rich. But Spotty and Fluffy love this, and Tari is getting a taste for it also.

I must get some sleep now, I will endeavour to get this sorted for tomorrow, I did take some photos tonight, just a few.

They are such lovely little babies, my house is going to be so quiet when the next little ones start to leave me. And thank you again Jane, for this little torch that hangs around my neck, it is invaluable at bedtimes, I can walk around, with all the lights off, this settles the kittens down, and I still have some light and my hands free!!!!!

Well, it is Wednesday morning now, and I was pleasantly surprised this morning, as Timothy got up before me, and moved the cat bedding tidily into the front room for me, let Percy out, and generally made the start of the morning a little less frantic!

I have just gone around taking photos of how everyone was 5 minutes ago, although since then, Cari ( no surprises) has come yelling down the stairs and is now sitting on my knee, and G has just gone and woken Tari up! They are having a brief rest, before they come for their second breakfast, and mid morning play!!! The bowls were empty, despite everything that I left out last night!!!

Tuesday 25th April
Today we gave the kittens their first run of the conservatory, having managed to get the children to tidy up their things over the weekend. It was not a planned introduction, but we were sat down at the table, in the conservatory, and we could see all these little faces, peering at us through the cat flap, and Gollum franticly trying to fight his way through it! His little face was so determined. I am sure if I had left him long enough, he would have fought his way through. He is certainly a clever wee thing, I don't think he will need any teaching how to use a flap. Whereas, even to this day, his mother has not got a clue. When she and Lil had general access to the conservatory, I had to prop the cat flap door open to let her in and out!!

When I opened the door to the conservatory, Percy was sleeping quietly on a chair in the corner. Had I planned all this, I would have had my camera ready. Poor unsuspecting Percy, who would not hurt so much as a hair on their little bodies.

He became aware of a sudden flood of little white bodies, with big ears, and little tails all standing up straight, consuming the room. His eyes became wide, as his worst night mare must have been materialising before his very eyes. I will give him credit, he did not move, or utter a sound, he just sat there watching him.

Until…….darling Jasmin made a leap for the chair, and suddenly, from out of no where, poor Percy was eye to eye with this small furry thing!!! At this point it all got too much for the poor boy, he hissed, and fled towards the door, whereupon I opened it and let him into the sanctuary of the garden.

They had a great time exploring the new room. It is quite a big conservatory, although quite an old one, entirely of glass, so they had a really good look at the outside.

As they are growing older, Gollum and Tari are without a doubt larger by quite a bit, they are going to be big cats as adults. Cari, Jasmin and Mini, are always going to be slighter.

Cari has become a little cling on though. She follows me about, demanding to be picked up, and for one so small, she has a very loud voice!!!

I will enclose some photos that I took last night, and I will also add one of Fluffy, one I really like, in Lily's updates. I probably wont have a diary entry for tomorrow, as I have a hospital appointment that will take up a large part of the morning, but I should, hopefully be back on line for Thursday.

Monday 24th April
It is almost midnight as I sit and write a few words. When my babies were really young, I would have been chuffed to be ready to sleep at this hour!! Now midnight is starting to feel late again!

I just sat downstairs with them all, as they settled down for the night. I had L and G and 6 kittens all in the wicker basket, only Fluffy was not with them, she was in her favourite place, in the kitchen, on the bread bin, under the units, snuggled on my clean t towels!!

They had been naughty kittens most of the evening!!! I have put my t cosy, which is in the shape and design of a tabby cat, wedged down between the washing machine and the units, so that they cannot squeeze in the tiny gap and get stuck. The current game is, let's get Tari or Auntie Fluffy, to pull the tea cosy out, and then we can go and hide down there, and get mum in a tizzy, cos she is worried about us!!!

Fluffy has also seen to it, to be her personal mission in life, to knock as much of my paperwork as possible onto the floor in the kitchen!!!!

We had a laugh tonight with Cari. She decided that watching the arrow on the screen was fun, she wanted to chase it. LOL, so she was sat on the lap top screen, inadvertently tapping keys, and as she did so, things happened on the screen, which in turn, caused her to want to catch the movement. My camera battery was charging up, so I could not catch it on camera. I have not taken any photos today, so I hope that I can get some good ones tomorrow morning.

It is quiet outside my room now. I have just checked on the children. Rich woke up when I went into his room, and he asked me, 'what on earth are you doing…' as I walked in with torch in my hand ( the torch that Jane gave me when she was here for the birth of the babies, it hangs round my neck, so it is very useful, thank you heaps Jane). Now he knows that I really do check on him at night time!!!

Sleep beckons now, but I will add a few more words in the morning. These little darlings are 11 weeks today, this time 11 weeks ago, I was facing a few nights without sleep, I am so proud that they have made the journey thus far, and they the sweet little darlings that they are……….sleep now……

Well, I managed to get to sleep. This morning, I am sitting here, and I can only describe the scene as chaotic! I feel as if I need a shield, there are kittens flying, and it really does feel like they are flying, everywhere. Every now and then one lands on me from somewhere. Fortunately the keyboard has a moderate amount of protection. Cari has taken to my shoulders, and has just leapt from no where onto them! I have just tried to take a photo or two, but when they are moving at such speed, it does become a little difficult to get anything that is not blurred!! I will go and try to sort out some photos now. Yesterday I posted some updated photos of Christmas and Noah, mailed to me from their new home.