One Week Old

Tonight a little before midnight marks one week since the kittens were born.

They are getting bigger and sleeping more on their own.  For the first few days of their lives, they seemed almost constantly latched on to Cali, or squirming around in pursuit of latching onto Cali.  The last few days Cali has been able to leave them a lot more and they are content to sleep in a little pile by themselves.

Cali never goes far, though.

The first few days after they were born, we did not touch them because we wanted to be sure that Cali bonded with them and we had read that sometimes a cat will reject her kittens if they are handled too soon.  I began letting the boys touch and hold the kittens a couple of days ago.  It's important for the kittens to get used to human contact so that they will be friendly pets.  And the boys have been dying to feel their soft fur.

Below, Junior is holding the largest kitten of the litter.

Today we just noticed that it is beginning to open it's eyes.

What a good mama!

It's Great to be Eight!

Junior had a birthday a little over a month ago.

We had a little party for him and he wanted the theme to be scorpions.  Hence, the cake.

For his party they played some interesting "scorpion" games (invented by Brandon) which began with a lecture about scorpions, by Brandon.  In which Brandon pretty much made everything up.  Do you think we should home school?

 If you are wondering what hanging in the tree has to do with scorpions, don't ask me.  But it makes a great picture.  And it was fun.

The kids also decorated scorpion t-shirts, which turned out pretty cool, but I forgot to take pictures of those.  And we delved into a little face painting, but I forgot to take pictures of that, as well.

Happy Birthday Junior!

1 1/2 Days Old

Do you want to see more kitten pictures?  Here you are.

This is one of the kittens' favorite daily activities:

New Arrivals

We purposefully did not get Cali fixed because I thought it would be cool for the kids to experience the miracle of birth through her.  A month or so ago, we noticed that Cali was getting a little bulge.  (The below picture is from a few weeks ago.)

This past week she looked especially large, and awkward.  Then yesterday, she was acting a little differently, whining and meowing a lot (though she has always been a little whiny), and even hissing at Brandon, when she has never hissed at any of us.  In the evening I put a sheet and some towels inside a box, she climbed in, and within fifteen minutes she was giving birth.  Here they are, about 12 hours later.

She gave birth to six kittens, but one did not make it.  I think five out of six is pretty good for a new mommy cat.  It's hard to believe that all of these kittens were in Cali's belly less than a day ago.  I'm surprised she didn't whine more.

PS.  These are the only kittens that Cali will have, as she will be having surgery soon after this.

PPS.  We no longer have Cali's brother, Jet.  He disappeared and we don't know what happened to him.

Visiting

 We were able to visit a lot of friends and family on our Spring Break vacation.

It was so great to see everyone again!

More Very Fine Art

Have you ever built something out of legos?  This guy sure has.

It's shocking!

The artist, Nathan Sawaya (self portrait pictured above), had an exhibit of his art at the Kimball Art Center in Park City while we were visiting so we went to see.

All of his art was made entirely out of legos.  All of the legos that he uses are purchased in sets from the store, the same as most people buy legos.

The thought of creating "art" out of legos was novel to me.  We thought it was very cool.

The "pop-up" book was the favorite of most of the boys.

The one pictured below was my favorite and also Onion Ring's.

Buttermilk Sky deeply contemplated the experience.

Very Fine Art

The HFAC (Harris Fine Arts Center) atrium is a very special place on BYU campus.  It is where prestigious student artwork is displayed.

Aunt Holli had some artwork on display that we got to go see.

We thought her ceramic sculptures were very cool.

We kind of miss this place.  Buttermilk Sky used to have his piano lessons in here (from the best teacher, ever), and we also used to like to go exploring and playing on campus.

So after everyone else left, Eggs, Junior and I (after riding up and down the elevators) checked out the new artwork outside the BYU Museum of Art.  It was very fowl.  (I know, I'm so punny.)  Luckily we didn't see any angry birds.  At least not openly--these birds did seem a little suppressed.  Meet "Tweety Cubed".

This one is titled "Bird Poop".

This one is titled "Bird Poop II".

"Cat's Eyes" (he's got them on the birds).

Or, "Cat Got No Tongue".

"Serenity".

"Doe, a Deer".

"Buck, a Deer".

"Charge!"

"Perfect Swing".

"Sharp".

"Dull (and Heavy)".

"Huuuuh"