The days are getting a bit longer here. Jocke took a few pictures of cats today. Miii is very cute. Both she and Albert are like kittens, always so playful.
Albert and Mii playing
Sunday afternoon
Tag Archives: cats
Merry Christmas!
We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! This year’s card is inspired with our White Squirrel’s activities. 
I drew it on paper, scanned it, processed it a bit and added the text in Gimp.
Many warm hugs from us and the cats!
Snow!
Yesterday we finally got some snow in Stockholm that did not melt immediately. We are experiencing an unusually warm winter so far. The cats were mesmerized with snow (as always). We put the food for small birds in the lilac bushes and the cats like to watch them eat it.
First snow, December 2011
Hmmm, Maven is on the window on the other side of the living room. But, where is Albert?
The White Squirrel
Last Sunday in November
Less than a month is left to Christmas! We started putting the decorations; so far the new curtains are up and yesterday we put the stars in the windows.
Our little helpers in action:
A black smoke bun, someone?
I have no clue how Maven manages to fit in such small boxes and baskets!
Albert, giving a helping paw as always:
My humans have no sense of composition!
Our cats adore the blankets we use during the winter; they are soft and cosy.
The Siamese pile
Miii chooses Jocke
About two months ago, we went away for a vacation and our cats spent eight days in a cat hotel. That was a new place, that they never visited before. It is close to where we live now.
It was the first time we picked the cats from a cat hotel that they were cuddling with the lady that took care of them! She really spent a lot of time with them and she seemed so sad when we got them. But, we were happy!
After they came back home, Miii decided that Jocke should be her human. I was always her preferred human. Although we planned that she will be Jocke’s cat when we got her, she picked me, there was no help. Jossan was pretty pissed off because of that and it took them a long time until they worked out how to share me. But now Miii decided that both Albert and Jossan is too much to share a human with and decided that she is best friend with Maven and that they share Jocke! Maven is not so delighted with that; Maven likes to be close to humans, not to other cats. Siamese like to sleep close to humans and close to each other, on the Pile.
"You and I, we are best friends!" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . "Oh, no, a Siamese..."
When Miii came to us, 2,5 years ago, she was very shy and hid from people who would visit us. She became more and more brave and social, but that happened slowly. Last week she yelled at one friend that came by and demanded that he pets her! Then she jumped in his lap and purred and demanded more petting. She did a similar thing to another friend that came by last Tuesday.
Miii discovered that you can get what you want from other people too, not only us, her humans.
Autumn colors
Leroy and Albert like to stand on the kitchen sideboard.
You can sit like this:
Leroy, the king of our house
Or hide a bit like this:
Albert
Or you can sit there nice as two ornaments. Albert and his grandfather Leroy:
Albert and Leroy
Blanche in her new home
Blanche moved into her new home nine days ago. That is an interesting home; two humans and three Siames cats, two of which are as white as Blanche! Yes, two Foreign Whites.
White Siamese (or – Foreign Whites) are not common. There are very few in Sweden and Norway. The first ones I saw in Sweden were Snow Queen and Snow Princess, the cats from a small cattery called Love me tender. I was in love, but it took a few years until we got our first white Siamese, this time from our own breeding. That is Albert. We kept him fertile for some time and two ladies were interested in mating their Siamese cats with him. Thanks to that now there is five more white Siamese in Sweden and Norway, and two of them will stay at their breeder’s homes.
Also, there are two more whites we got – Balthazar and Blanche. Blanche, Jossan’s white daughter moved to Love Me Tender cattery!
Blanche was tough while we were there, for a few hours. But then we left and she realized that she is small, the other cats are big. They smell and sound differently and everything is new and scary! The humans were nice and she was petted, kissed, fed and played with, and the big cats left her alone, so it was not all bad after all. She is sleeping in her humans’ bed every night, under the blanket.
A day after she moved to her new home, she was already playing around in the apartment, but was also afraid and careful at times. During the following few days she was playing tough with the big cats, roared at them (she is tiny and they are big ) and even followed them and ‘attacked’ them as a little terrorist!
With time she got tired of all that and being the baby she is, she needed some more love and attention from the big cats, not only humans. The big cats were curious, but certain rituals had to be fulfilled. Cats have their rules and protocols and they stick to them!
Yesterday: Blanche sitting next to Sessan. Sessan is ignoring her.
This evening we got a picture from her ‘mom’. Sessan, one of the big cats came and lied next to the little Blanche and licked her! Then Coco licked her also. What a happiness for little Blanche! She is a part of her new cat family!
Today, finally: "You are small and yucky, but I'll lick you. But, only because I feel like it".
Blanche’s new mom blogs about her cats here, it is in Swedish.
We miss Blanche, but we are happy that she is so loved in her new home and that it is going so well for her! Many thanks for the pictures and regular updates to Blanches new mom, Dragana.
11 weeks (part 3: Ferdinand)
Who is that?
Ferdinand! I mean - Balthazar!
11 weeks (part 2: reflections)
The kittens were curious about the table in the guest room. They were a bit surprised with their reflections. Earlier there were stuff on it, so I guess they did not notice how funny it actually is.
The kittens saw mirrors before, and they were a bit excited about other cats back there.
Beatrice, 11 weeks
Balthazar (front) and Blanche
Belle
Balthazar (front) and Blanche
11 weeks (part 1)
The kittens turned 11 weeks today! They are so big now. Next week they are getting their second vaccine and in two-four weeks they will be moving to their new homes. The feelings are mixed. They are all moving to very good homes and we are looking forward to see how it goes for them in the future.
This is how the beginning of our evening with the kittens looked like (it is Stockholm, and summer, it is still not completely dark yet).
In the living room, Leroy was sleeping on one of his sheep
While in another room, the kittens were slowly waking up from their afternoon nap (Bea, Blanche and Jossan is behind them)
Balthazar and Belle, on another highest part of the cat tree
"You were saying?"
B-litter; a photo session that went wrong
We tried to take some photos of the kittens today. They turned 10 weeks and all of them weigh over 1kg!
Here is a number of photos we took today.
And this is how it looked most of the time (one of their favorite toys is on the picture, it is made to look like a real dragon fly and we cannot leave them alone with it because of the plastic parts. They are crazy about it. The big cats adore it, too):
It's mine!
Albert feels fine
Albert feels well, and behaves as usual, except that he is much more at my side. Last night he slept in our bedroom and we closed the door so the other cats would not disturb him. Leroy was a bit upset, he protested for 5 minutes from the other side of the door.
Albert thought that all the attention was very nice. He cuddled and slept next to us all night.
I started working again today, but Jocke is at home with the cats, he has one more week of vacation. Albert ate this morning and he seems fine. And he is so happy. He is not weak or anything like it, he is moving and behaving as a strong healthy cat. The whole Friday drama feels so unreal.
Tired Siamese
It is very warm in Stockholm during daytime. Jocke put together a new desk for my hobby room.
Cats got so tired from watching all the work. Cats love work. It fascinates them.
"Nothing would ever get done if it weren't for us!"
7 weeks pictures. And the tree.
The individual pictures from the Monday photo session are now uploaded here.
And the cat tree… it was so much fun for the small cats to get the whole new tall furniture! We did not put anything that tall in their room earlier since they are small and not scared of anything, but yesterday we bought them the furniture with a lot of funny parts, 165 cm tall. We padded the space around it with a lot of pillows. The kittens went crazy, climbing, jumping and behaving like little monkeys. Jossan was not happy at all. She gave us that look – ‘Are you completely insane!?’
In the morning we found all the kittens sleeping in the cat house with the pillows put over the entrance. Jossan lured them in and dragged the pillows and blocked the small ones from exiting the tipi! 
Jossan is such a clever cat and a good mom. She never ceases to impress me.
Jocke took a cool video of the tree, seen from a kitten’s perspective:
More pictures from yesterday and today:
Belle peeking
Beatrice, boldly going where no kitten has gone before
Your tail! My tail? Wait...
B-litter, day #3, part 1
Day #3, we are growing!
B-litter, day #2
The kittens are almost two days old and they are growing before our eyes.
We weighed them this evening and three of them went 20 gr up already and one went up 28gr! Jossan is so proud of them, and the big cats come and sit and watch the small ones few times per day, from a meter or two of distance.
I wonder what Albert is thinking… he is so excited, and scared and curious at the same time. He can just sit and calmly watch his mom and his small siblings for hours.
My sun!
Albert loves to lie in the sun. There is plenty of space on the couch close to the window, on the floor, on the cat furniture…
But sometimes Albert wants all the 20 sqm of sunny spots for himself! Greedy Albert!
"Bad Miii! Go away from my sun! MY SUN!"
But, Miii is so cute! She deserves all the sunny spots in the world! Albert is still small and silly and has moments when he wants EVERYTHING for himself.
"Look at me! I am so cute!"
PRA (progressive retinal atrophy) test
Jossan and Albert are tested negative for PRA.
That is great news, it means that the kittens any of them parents will never get PRA and become blind, no matter whether the other parent is a carrier or not (this is an autosomal recessive condition). The disease is not associated with gender. Since it is a recessive disease – two copies of the gene, in this case - CEP290 mutation are required for the cats to lose their vision. There is no treatment available for the condition.
PRA stands for Progressive Retinal Atrophy.
The cats with two copies of the CEP290 mutation have normal vision at birth. Vision loss progresses slowly and is variable, with most cats becoming blind by usually 3-5 years of age. Some estimates are that 33% of Siamese and related breeds are carriers of the mutation, meaning that about 11% of them will eventually become blind later in life.
You can check which cats are tested so far and what the results are here. Click on [h] far right next to the cat’s name to see the test results.
Please observe: not everyone has tested their cats used in breeding programs yet. I have become aware of this just a few months ago, after a study in Finland has been done. Also, not everyone is going to register the results in Pawpeds; not all the breeders are aware of the existence of the Pawpeds – the cat database. But more and more reports will arrive with time. If you plan to mate your Siamese/Balinese/Oriental or buy a kitten from a breeder, make sure you know the PRA status of the cat in question. Carriers and PRA-negative cats will never develop PRA. Only homozygous cats will.
The goal is that with selective breeding where a carrier can be mated only with a non-carrier we will be able to minimize the appearance of the mutation within the Siamese gene pool.
We sent our cats’ DNA to Veterinary Genetics Laboratory, UC Davis, California. We got the results 8 days after the lab had received my letter with the samples. Read more about PRA here.
Information in Swedish:
Om PRA: http://www.pawpeds.com/healthprogrammes/pra_se.html
Rekommendationer: http://www.pawpeds.com/healthprogrammes/prarecommendations_se.html
Från rekommendationer:
“Alla köpare av kattungar som är bärare och kattungar vars PRA-status är okänd (där inte båda föräldrarna är fritestade och negativa) ska informeras om sjukdomen, om det faktum att en förälder är bärare och om den risk som finns om kattungen används i avel.
Heterozygota bärare kommer visserligen aldrig att få några symptom och då kan man lätt tänka att informationen är irrelevant för den som köper en kattunge bara till sällskap.
Men eftersom det inte alls är ovanligt att köpare av katter till sällskap senare ändrar sig och i alla fall vill ta en kull efter sin katt och de då kanske drar igång det hela utan att höra med uppfödaren till katten, så är det lika viktigt att köpare av kattungar till sällskap också till fullo förstår vad sjukdomen innebär och vad det kan betyda för deras kattunge.”
P.S. Goofy, dad to A-litter and dad to the upcoming litter will also be tested for PRA in the near future. Judging from Albert’s results, he is negative or in the worst case, a carrier, but cannot be a homozygote.
Updated, May 2011: Goofy is also tested PRA-negative. All the kittens that he and Jossan had are PRA-negative since both parents are not carriers.
Cats in the sun
Jossan, Miii and Albert are resting in the sun. Albert is hardly visible, he fits the background so well.
There is 38 days left until the kittens arrive, if everything goes well. Jossan is going up in weight just fine, 430gr since the start of the pregnancy.
She was clumsy and quite active lately and played and rolled on the floor with the toys, and even fell once (10 days ago) from a shelf, but she still continued going up in weight really well and shows no signs of discomfort at all. We are going for a checkup and an ultrasound exam in 2 days (on Tuesday).
Jossan is dating again!
Jossan (S*Me-Na-Yak Call Me Josephine Brown) is dating again!
Her date is – Goofy, IC S*Edo Créma de Luxe, the dad of the A-litter! Although Albert and Goofy have different looks, there are similarities; Albert is white like his dad and moves and has a body language that is pretty much the same! That was quite amazing to see, I did not remember from before how Goofy moved and cuddled. He was mostly stunned and excited when we introduced him to Jossan last year, so he did not interact with us a lot.
Here is a picture of Goofy and his brother Musse we took when we left Jossan in Sala, about 1 hour 15 minutes drive from Stockholm, two days ago.
It was a bit funny; the first time we were there, about a year ago, Jossan seemed to be scared, and hid immediately. But now – she jumped on the kitchen table, behaved as if Sofie’s apartment was her summer house or something. She apparently recognized where she was and she was not displeased. After a few minutes we let Goofy in and he started singing and flirting with Jossan. Then we gave them some privacy and left. We got a message from Goofy’s owner yesterday, she witnessed one mating and heard another!
We miss Jossan, but we do not miss her yelling and calling for a guy. She (as the most of cats) calls a lot when in heat. Also, Albert had to be separated from her, and it was not fun for anyone, but he has such a nice temper and we have a big house, and enough cats so that everyone has a company. Albert is still small, but he changes from Dr Jekyll to Mr Hyde when he feels that Jossan is going in heat. Then he is all stud, 110%, calling and following Jossan. But when his mom is not in heat, or when she is away, he is a little baby, playing with his toys and cuddling with us all the time.
We hope that this time we are as lucky as last year, that Jossan has a problem-free pregnancy and nursing period, and above all – that she remains healthy and gets healthy babies. If all goes well, the delivery will be around the 4th of May.
Ullisen
Swedish word ‘ull’ means ‘wool’ in English, and Ullisen could be translated to something like ‘Wooly’. Last week I bought Ullisen to our cats! Ullisen is made of wool from sheep from Öland (an island in Sweden) and with ecological catnip. Our cats have a hundred of toys. Some they love more, some not so much. You can never know what would be their favorite toy. They do not like the same toys. Jossan does not like toys at all.
The cats love Ullisen. No one of our cats is a wool-chewer, but it must be something in wool that tastes really good, since they love to play with it. Even Jossan plays with it sometimes (and she does not play with toys since she became fertile, 2,5 years ago, she is like, so above it…). But, Ullisen is really a Leroy’s toy. Although Albert thinks they should share. But, Leroy does not share toys. Oh, no.
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P.S. I bought Ullisen on Tradera (Swedish ebay, sort of), but the lady that makes ullisar also has a site here.
1st prize!
Last week we won the 1:st prize on Siameslinjens (our cat club) photo competition for our ‘Birdwatching’ picture! 42 photos were sent in, some of them very nice. I was so happy! It is one of those pictures I had to take very fast, in order to seize the moment when the cats were sitting so nicely in the window, equidistant, like little ornaments shaped as cats.
I had the light in the background, could not use the flash, did not have much time to focus, but it was a nice situation and a not so bad composition. The judge’s motivation for awarding the 1:st prize to this photo was “för sin utpräglade vardagssurrealism” (“for its striking surrealism of everyday life”).
We are very happy!
Everybody loves sheep
A month ago we bought a sheep-shaped soft pillow that caused a lot of excitement in our cat group. It is funny with cats. Sometimes you buy them a toy you are certain they will love, but they do not care about it all. At other times, some, in your eyes, very boring thing becomes an immediate hit. We thought they might like the sheep, but we did not expect that it will be so popular. (We bought the sheep in Chilli, they have a store close to where we live).
Maven was the first to hug, pet and take care of her sheep friend. She would clean herself, walk all over the sheep, put it in the right shape and then sleep on it or beside it.
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But, then, Leroy also liked the sheep. He was jealous of Maven and stole the sheep whenever he could.
Leroy also loves the sheep
Then the other cats wanted the sheep as well.
After a few weeks of occasional quarreling about the sheep, we went and bought them 3 more sheep! One in beige color as the first one, and two white ones. Of course, NO ONE wanted any sheep when there were so many around, but after a few days, everyone loves sheep again.
Jossan licking the sheep goodnight
Everyone loves sheep!
Siamese and the white sheep
The winner takes it all. Or?
Well, no. Last Friday, in our cat group was more like – Leroy takes it all.
This picture of Miii and Albert posing in front of the Christmas tree won the 3rd prize (shared) on the Siames i Fokus Christmas 2010 competition and our prize arrived in the mailbox two days ago! Three yummy furry mice toys! (Thank you Nilla!)
Albert apparently thought that he and Miii were the ones who deserved the prize the most, since they posed for the picture, and went eagerly for the mice, but Leroy thought that such an opinion was ridiculous. He tossed two of the mice under the sofa immediately and then started playing with the third one. Alone!
 Oh, that is a yummy mouse! |
 Albert, you may watch while I am playing with the mouse. |
 Look, the mouse is flying! I am flying! |
 Someone help!!! Grandpa Leroy is a big bully! Muaaaaaaa |
Butterfly curtains
We are arranging one of the rooms as ‘the kitty room’, where we keep their furniture, clean towels, beds, some of our books etc.
In the future this is where we will have the kittens when they are small. Right now the litter boxes are also there, but we will place them in the cellar later.
We kept the wallpaper on one wall (put by the previous house owners). This was one of their children rooms, and there are butterflies on the wallpaper. We thought it looks cute in the kitty room.
We also bought a curtain with butterflies as well and yesterday we put that up. Ribbons were highly appreciated!
(För er som bor i Sverige – vi köpte gardinen här: hissgardin Audrey . Jag tror att det finns tyg och gardinlängder med samma mönster).
Albert and his siblings turned 8 months yesterday. They all are big and healthy and loved.
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Here is Albert, enjoying the new curtain!
