From May 29-Sept. 16, 2021, we fostered a 2-year-old spayed and microchipped cat named Miss Grey through Best Friends Animal Society. My kids had been wanting a pet, and fostering was a great way to see if we had allergy problems and how a cat fit into our life. My Husband and I picked her up from their Salt Lake center and surprised the kids (although they were suspicious as I had moved our Betta fish into an upstairs room earlier that day). We set her things up in our laundry room, opened the carrier, and she immediately hid behind the washing machine:
She bolted into the garage on day 2 and we found her 24 hours later up and under our truck! We started it to scare her out and made a barrier of family members and brooms to herd her toward the house. Thankfully that worked, and she didn’t get lost in the neighborhood/eaten by coyotes. She finally got brave enough to wander around the house in our presence after about 10 days.
Miss Grey was hilarious and so athletic with her toys, especially the ping pong ball. She began following me around the house and sticking her paws under doors when she knew I was on the other side. I put a blanket in the hall near our bedroom door where she often slept at night--no pets in the bed at night for us!
She was so agile that she had no problem jumping onto the foosball table mid-game, onto the hall ledge with my magnet board, or smushing herself under furniture:
I got a cat tower that she spent lots of time in, especially when someone was playing the piano:
She wasn't very cuddly though, and only 1st Brother was brave enough to pick her up--he wasn't as scared of her half-hearted swats and bites as the rest of us were:
She got way too brave jumping on the stair railings and posts. I was sure she was going to fall, but she only scratched up the paint while giving us all heart attacks:
She was easy to care for and we loved having her, but a couple of us felt itchy and she was a bit of a psycho, so we decided to get the Siberian Forest kitten we'd been on a waiting list for and return Miss Grey. I tried to find her a home, paying for an online classified ad, updating her Best Friends profile with additional info and pics, and asking people at work, friends of friends, etc. if they wanted her, but we ultimately took her back. Of course she jumped into my lap for the first time like an hour before our return appointment, and I cried when we dropped her off. She did get adopted a couple of months later.
We picked up our kitten about a week later on Sept 24 from Utah Siberian cats in Payson. It turns out the breeders, the Trasks, had been in the same church congregation as my cousin and his wife, and they also knew my friend from high school. I'd been following their Instagram account and been keeping tabs on the only female in the litter--she had 4 brothers--who would likely be ours. Here is her mom Opal and the post about her birth:
We had a chance to get a male cat from a litter that went home in August, but my husband really wanted a girl, and since he'd grown up with both, I deferred to him. We almost had to wait until October as the breeders were going to keep our girl at one point, but they decided not to. So we paid $2,000 and brought her home. (I felt a little gross about the cost since Miss Grey would have been $25 and was already fixed and chipped, but we tried!). Even though they are long-haired, the Siberian breed has less of the protein in their saliva that makes people allergic, so that alone has been worth the price.
I came up with some Halloween names since she has all the colors, then we almost named her Bobbi because she looks like a bobcat. But Sister suggested Coco, and that seemed to be the best fit though it's not that original. She was immediately friendly and very, very cute:
Aren't her markings cool? Here she is staring at a bag of cat food, and you can see the split-down-the-middle orange and black hair on the back of her head:
Her front paw colors are really interesting too:
This is one of my favorite pictures when she found a cozy spot next to a kitchen heat vent:
She's very curious and social. She usually greets us at the door when we return home, and she likes to be where we are:
My sister got an adorable labradoodle puppy around the same time we got Coco. A dog wasn't an option because the allergies are miserable for a few of us, but I was glad because we didn't have to deal with the potty training, sharp-tooth bites, humping, and eat-anything snarfing that she did. Cats are so easy! The long hair is a little annoying, but we've had zero poop or pee accidents, she doesn't need to be walked, bathed, groomed, socialized, or trained, she doesn't scratch up our stuff, and we can leave her for a day or two with no pet sitter if needed. It turns out that I'm a cat person!
Miss Grey liked to sit in boxes, and Coco does too. She rushes over if we open any sort of cabinet to investigate sitting there, and she likes to get inside pop-up hampers, plastic bags, and sit on suitcases:
She's an indoor cat--I decided that in part when I read Cats for Dummies and it said they can get mites from birds or rodents that they kill outside. No thank you! But we do take her outside while holding her sometimes, and she's been out with a harness and leash in the backyard:
She loves Nerf darts and will do a chattering, clicky noise with her mouth before we throw or shoot them. There's one in the cuckoo picture of her below, and we find them in her water and food bowls a lot:
She has a strange reaction to strawberries (?) and rubs her head and cheeks on the plastic packaging and gently bites it:
This was my view when I glanced over one day in the kitchen. She lies on her back a lot and looks so floofy:
She rarely uses the cat tower or the scratching surfaces I've purchased for her, and she doesn't like wet cat food or treats that we've tried, although she does react to cat nip. She often sleeps on the tops of the back cushions of our comfy family room chairs, and she hangs out on the old kitchen chair that is now hers during dinner and while looking out the back window. Her grooming routine had been interrupted in this picture:
Coco brings us so much joy and comfort, and we are very glad to have her.
