Sheila and Sarah - Day 6

Sarah and Sheila Day 6

Well . . . yesterday Mom wrote for both of us as I was in the middle of crunch time preparing for a couple final presentations that I had to present to day. Now today, I am writing for both of us because Mom is at home sick with the flu. Uff, life.

I'm a little down in the dumps right now. For the last week, I was fostering the sweetest kitten. I called her Monkey. Monkey was probably three months old or so and she was such a doll. She was very chatty and normally had a lot to say. I spent most of the week with her in the spare bedroom while I plugged away at my homework. She was always sitting on my lap or lying on the floor by my feet. I even slept in here for a few nights when I was working on school until the wee hours of the night. Mom has spent the night here twice this last week too, so she and Monkey had some serious bonding time as well. Mom could hardly get enough of her. There was just something about her that made her very special. But tonight, Monkey went to her furever home.

Monkey came to the rescue just a couple weeks ago when a really nice gal found her keeping warm under the hood of her car. Unfortunately, the tip of Monkey's ear was burned off, and she was a little underweight, but she was otherwise very lucky. The gal that found her decided to foster her but she had to go out of town for a week, so the shelter called and asked me to take her in temporarily. Of course I gladly accepted.

Jesse and I foster for the Cats Cradle on an emergency basis. That means we normally have the cats for about a month or less. We're kind of a stepping stone between the pound and the long term foster family. We decided to do emergency fostering because we still live in an apartment so we have to be careful that we don't get kicked out. We had our very first foster kitty, Sturgis, when we were living in our townhouse. They didn't mind that we fostered cats at all because we had an abundance of space. We fostered Sturgis for about three months before we failed and kept him. After three months, he really grew on us and seemed to be growing on our other two cats. Plus, we were first timers at that point, so letting go was harder than anticipated.

I always treat my fosters as if they are my own. It usually doesn't take me longer than an hour to completely fall in love with them. I still cry every time I let them go. For the last year or so, Jesse and I have taken in A LOT of kittens. Sometimes with a mom, and sometimes without. The most we have taken in is seven. Six kittens and their mom. They were a couple months old so they were rambunctious but so much fun! Every time we have new fosters in the house, I get scared that I'll want to keep one. It's usually easier for me to refrain when there are more than one at a time. I have the hardest time letting go when we have just one kitten, like Peanut, or Monkey.

Monkey's other foster mom decided to keep her. I feel good knowing that she has a great home! Monkey's mom was so excited to have her baby, her eyes just lit up! I'm sure that bond is much stronger between the two of them because she was the person who found Monkey in the first place. I'm just glad I didn't have her here with me any longer than a week or I probably wouldn't have been able to give her back. Say goodbye is always a bitter-sweet moment, but I'm so thankful for happy endings.

Sarah