No Preparedness Plan for the Cats

Recently our smoke detector (after some heavy use due to my cooking) decided it needed new batteries. It started chirping to alert us to this fact. Smoke detectors are annoying, we all know this, but to Sabes and Liam…it’s the end of the world.

As soon as the chirping started they took off to separate corners of the apartment to hide (great plan in case of a fire: hide and hope it goes away). Below are their lovely hiding spots, where they stayed until we came home with new batteries (which we ran out to get immediately because the cats were so distraught).

Liam seems to favor a duck-and-cover strategy

Sabriel is more of a bunker-down sort of cat

 

 

Cauliflower or catnip?

In my never-ending quest to eat healthier, we made mashed cauliflower as a side with dinner the other day. Now, it’s a super tasty dish…but super messy to make. I ended up with cauliflower pieces EVERYWHERE. On the counters, in the sink, under the grates on the stove…and on the floor. As many a cat owner knows, anything on the floor is fair game, so here’s where the fun begins.

Here I am, cooking away, and I hear the jingle jingle of Liam’s collar and the distinct thud of him slamming his body into the ground behind me. I turn around to find Liam on the floor, flopping around. And first, I thought he was just being weird, but then it was pointed out to me that he had a piece of cauliflower. Now, it was understandable that I missed his toy because not only is he mostly white and the cauliflower is white…but he had the tiniest microscopic piece he could find as well. I tried to give him a bigger piece, but he wanted nothing to do with the bigger piece.

This is good…

Yeah, this is great!

Let me roll on top of it…

Smells good too!

More rolling

He would flop and roll on the cauliflower, then sniff it, then pick it up and run away, and then bring it back and flop on top of it again. The funniest part is that this is exactly how he acts with catnip. He was loopy and crazy, running around the apartment and jumping up and down from his cat tree. So apparently vegetables are catnip for Liam too…who knew?

Do your cats do this?

King of the Jungle

We ventured into DC to go to the zoo, and I have to say, I’m really liking the metro: way easier than driving into town.

In terms of the zoo, I have to say, I’m pretty spoiled having only really gone to the Detroit Zoo most of my life, so I have pretty high expectations. I really enjoyed the National Zoo though! It was larger than I thought it would be, and larger than it looked, and there were quite a few really cool animals (besides the felines you’ll see below). The habitats were a little smaller than the Detroit Zoo, but definitely not the smallest enclosures I’ve ever seen. Check out the cool felines we saw!

Now, we can’t forget our very own felines in this post. Specifically: King Liam. Not Sir Liam. Not Prince Liam. KING Liam. Want to know how we know this? We tried the other titles. There he was, sitting on a pillow like a stately fellow, and we called him “Sir Liam!” No response. “Prince Liam?” Nothing. “King Liam?” He turned his head slowly and stared at us like “Yes, lowly peasants? What can I help you with?” Clearly he doesn’t understand where the food comes from in this household.

King Liam on his throne

King of the Jungle? Maybe not. King of the Living Room? Most definitely (or at least we’ll let him think so).

What do you think? Any similarities?

-JLS

Fireworks and Fatties

The 4th of July is one of my favorite holidays. After a 4th of July mishap with fireworks (Saw fireworks. Tried to get closer to fireworks to see them better. Could see fireworks worse the closer we got.), we decided to go to Alexandria’s birthday celebration the following weekend. We happened upon a really great location actually and got some sweet photos.

I definitely got my fireworks fix (although I definitely still felt a little homesick for fireworks on Portage Lake).

The cats didn’t seem too worried about the fireworks though. Sabes was just hanging out most of the weekend. She also discovered her favorite spot on the couch.

This seems comfy…

-JLS

Cats on the Move

We’ve been living in NoVa (learned quickly this was an acronym for Northern Virginia) for over a month now, and we’re all settled in (including finally finding the card reader, yay!). This was a big move for all of us, especially the furry members of our family. Liam even had to pack himself!

Alright Dad, box me up!

Meanwhile, Sabes preferred to supervise the moving activities.

Sabriel took advantage of the new playscape.

Liam and Sabes are not incredibly fond of car rides (nor are we fond of being in cars with them), so they got to take a little nap on our 11 hour car trip. Liam found the trip rather off-putting, hissing at movers and family alike as he transitioned homes. Once settled, however, the cats learned to enjoy their new home…until the incident.

One day, out of the blue, Liam became inexplicably terrified of a folder. It occupied his thoughts and he spent incredible amounts of time staring at it. And then we did the unthinkable. We moved the folder. That threw Liam’s world into a tailspin that lasted over 48 hours. The whole apartment became terrifying, especially the dining room, and Buddy proceeded to slink from one corner of the apartment to another, carefully making sure nothing was going to eat him. And then it stopped, and the world was right again. Weird cat.

Sabriel, on the other hand, has taken the move in stride, becoming sassier than ever and insisting on playing fetch with her toys…until she loses them.

So close…yet so far

All in all, we’re really liking Metro DC, and there will be updates to come about our post-4th of July fireworks and Zoo adventures (as well as sassy, bad cat adventures as well!)

Stay tuned!

Blurry…but the best family photo we have of them right now

 

-JLS (Jenn, Liam, and Sabes)