My Kitten Experiences in Life
I had the good fortune to grow up on a farm, I didn’t think it was at the time but as I get older I have come to cherish all the opportunities I was exposed to as a child. Things that kids today, living in the big city like my children do, don’t truly understand. Things like the meaning of a hard days work, of being responsible for chores that were more important than just cleaning your room or taking out the trash. I consider myself to be a very hard worker because of the lifestyle when I was growing up, as much as I hated it at the time it still has made me a better person for it.
One of the many events I was lucky enough to witness was the birth of litters of kittens each spring. If you have never been blessed with this, it is a sight to behold. My ‘mother’ cat when I was young was very prompt every spring to make sure I had a litter of kittens to take care of. When it was close to the time for her to give birth I would make sure she had a nice sized box, one that would contain the kittens for a few months, lined it with towels and placed it in a dark, warm place. She was always really good about delivering her babies in that box too.
On the day of the birth I would just peer into the box anxiously waiting to see how many kittens I would get this time. Newborn kittens are so cute with their little tiny ears, little tiny mouths and almost hairless feet and strangely enough their eyes didn’t open until day ten after their birth. I would count down the days until my new babies could see me the way I could see them! Kittens are just so cute, you want to pick them up and never put them down! As you can tell I am definitely a cat person, I connect with cats more so than dogs. There is nothing more satisfying than walking outside and calling for the cats and two dozen of them just come running from all directions, granted you are about to feed them but it is still very cool.
I know everyone now days says you are not supposed to feed your pets anything other than cat food or dog food, when I was feeding all my kittens I used to give them dry milk (of course not dry when I fed it to them) and dry cat food, we used to buy a fifty pound bag which would last a long time, until the dog got into it one day and decided to drag it around the yard, what a mess. In the cold winter months of west central Minnesota I also used to feed the cats cooked oatmeal, they would go crazy for it. I remember more than once going out in the morning before going to school (like I did every day) to take them a pan of freshly cooked oatmeal, I wouldn’t even get the pan to the ground before it was completely covered with cats.
Everyday after school and after my chores were done for the day I would spend all my time with my new playmates. Each kitten is unique and each has a different personality just like people. Some kittens like to climb, some just want to be held and cuddled, some want to fight and horse around and some just want to be left alone. There is nothing more adorable than a bunch of month old kittens playing with each other, that is a memory you never want to forget.