Tuesday 30 March 2010

Nearly 1 week old






Miss Gatsby and her kittens are doing very well. About 24 hours after having the kittens, mum got a little stressy about it all, wanted to hide her babies and wasn't settling to feed them as well as I would have liked, but it wasn't long before she was much happier and now she is a pretty chilled mum.
The kittens are growing well, obviously there is no indication of any charactor traits that they may have but a couple have really nice coats at the moment. They are all fat as butter and very content. One of the girls has had her eyes open for a couple of days already and the other girl is just starting to open hers, the boys are typical boys and can't be bothered to open theirs yet. The girls are the two dark kittens the blue and the other pale coloured one are boys.

Wednesday 24 March 2010

Kittens



Miss Gatsby had her babies this morning (early hours). Mum and her 4 kittens are doing well. I think we have 3 boys and 1 girl but will check again in a few days.
Nice to have something to smile about again :-)

Monday 22 March 2010

When things go wrong

Not having a good week, last week on Thursday evening, I was travelling down to my friend Rosie, near London so that we could travel to Crufts together (a long standing tradition for the pair of us). I set out at 7pm and had to follow a long diversion as the A303 was closed. At 9pm on a dark road with no signposts the engine went on my car. The RAC was called and I was informed that as a lady on my own I would be treated as a priority - he arrived at 10:45, very nice man. There was no option other than towing me back home and he could only take me so far as he couldn't leave his area. We were met at a service station and changed towing vehicles for the remainder of the journey, eventually getting home at 2:15am.
Due to the nature of Grahams' work we had to hire a car the next day, which he said I could borrow to get to London whilst he would have the van. I set off with no problems (brand new car, less than 800 miles on the clock) and arrived on time. Rosie did the driving to and from Crufts and then I set off for home on Sat evening. About 2/3rds of the way home the clutch started to stick so I drove the last part of the journey trying not to change gear. As I pulled into our road the clutch went completely!! Needless to say I wasn't allowed to drive the replacement car that arrived the following day (2 cars in 2 days).

We have since been quoted £5,500 to fix the car, far in excess of the cars value.

Oh well I thought, I know what any money we get from the pups is going towards. Had Martha scanned on Thursday which showed she is not pregnant, Sorry to all those who have enquired about a silver pup, hopefully that is the 3rd piece of bad luck.

So now on top of trying to figure out my transport issues I am having to rethink my puppy plans for this year. I am still waiting for Rhonda to come in season and will mate her as soon as possible, she has always had irregular seasons so although I am disappointed she has not come in yet, I am not surprised. I am now planning to mate Dollar, she is due in season next month. This will be a repeat of the mating that produced Martha, as I have had lovely feedback about this litter from all that had a puppy, and Martha is a lovely dog to live with (and in my opinion quite beautiful).

I think there may have been an accident with Alfie and Betty as she is looking very rounded 6 weeks after her season, time will tell. I think next time she is in season I may have to send her or Alfie to stay with a friend as although I am very careful about keeping them separate, it is a busy household with lots of visitors and doors do get left open.

Hopefully my next post will be a bit more cheerful as I am currently waiting for Miss Gatsby (my black/chocolate smoke Devon Rex) to have her kittens- due any minute.