Schimmel Siamese & Oriental Cats are Oriental cat breeders based in Oxford, UK. We sometimes have Oriental and Siamese kittens for sale. We also have 2 Oriental Stud Cats and online kitten diaries.

We are 8 weeks old today!

Day 55 - September 18, 2005

The babies bed that used to reside on the floor has now been removed altogether. As the weather has been quite cold, we've had the heating on in the house so all of the babies have been sleeping on the radiator bed, and also sprawled out on top of the food tubs. No one had slept on the floor bed for over 24 hours so I put a vet bed on the tub so now the babies all sleep on top of that as well as still sleeping on the radiator bed. They haven't played on the floor a great deal today because it's so cold, they have instead had lots of wrestling matches on the tub and on the radiator bed. The biggest fun for our Chocolate Bars at the moment is to see how many Dancers they can push off the beds in the shortest space of time. Twix is very relentless when it comes to this game but he has a battle on his hands when it comes to our Red Dancers who will give just as good as they get. Buttons and Whispa are extremely "motherly" at the moment and after meal times, when they've had a run about and are all back on the beds, both girls make sure that every baby who is lying next to them gets a thorough bath. Even when everyone else has fallen asleep, they will lie there and keep grooming everyone which is so sweet.

Day 54 - September 17, 2005

All entries are the same today.

This is a horrific day as we have lost Samba, with seemingly no apparent reason. He was way behind everyone else in the weight department by about 150grams and as mentioned in previous entries, he would not eat from the plate at all. He quite literally just dropped dead on us. It's so incredibly heartbreaking and what makes it worse is that this has happened when all our other downstairs babies are doing so brilliantly. They have massive appetites, they are little terrors and are so very active.

Day 53 - September 16, 2005

The entries today have gone on slightly later than normal because I had to wait until the babies were awake so that I could take photos of them. The Chocolate Bars are all thrilled to bits that they now have a radiator bed in their room. I had brought it down from upstairs yesterday as our older cats constantly kept pulling it off the radiator and dragging it through the house so I figured it was better off with the babies. They absolutely love it, particularly Twix who thinks I brought it downstairs for him and him alone. When the Chocolate Bars are awake and playing, they climb the scratch post and get onto the bed that way. The difference with Twix is that when he climbs the scratch post and then sits right on the very top of it, surveying his domain, before taking a flying leap onto the radiator bed, usually landing on some poor unsuspecting litter mate. Both mums are also thrilled to bits with having the radiator bed in the back room and they are making a lot of use of it.

Day 52 - September 15, 2005

The Chocolate Bars have now developed a fascination with my slippers :( Yes, I will admit to wearing slippers around the house during the day because they are very soft and if I accidentally stood on a baby, then damage would be minimal. I also leave them under my desk when I'm sitting here working and walk about in socks. But anyway, the point is that whenever I leave my slippers on the floor now, the Chocolate Bars all sit in them and on them and go to sleep, as opposed to sleeping in their own beds. I went to slip my foot into them this morning and knocked 2 Crunchie and Whispa off them in the process because I didn't look at them first, just went to put my foot in the place where the slippers should be. Amaretto is again going through one of her spells where the babies don't interest her much which is a shame. Fortunately, Drambuie has enough love for a 100 babies which does make up for it. Just a pity she doesn't have 100 nipples as well! Although, that does conjure up a rather scary image.

Day 51 - September 14, 2005

At the moment, everything seems so surreal. I am feeling really down about having now lost 2 of Sambuca's babies. As I said in Sami's diary entry for today, it all feels as if I'm just living in a nightmare right now and would just like to wake up and find that everything is okay. But the cold, hard facts are that this is not going to happen, and that we still have our Chocolate Bars, T's and Dancers, and to them, nothing has changed, life just goes on as per normal. In a way they are right, because even with the problems upstairs, unlike many other things in life, we can never just give up. Our cats and our other babies are still here, still creating havoc and are still very much a massive part of our lives and family. I am sure there must be a light at the end of the tunnel somewhere even though right now, this would appear to be a long way off.

One thing I've noticed about our Chocolate Bars recently is that when the mum's are around i.e. on the bed, eating etc. they no longer come running over to be fed from mum's. They are more interested in either eating from the plate, the dry kitten bowl, or playing amongst themselves so they are now starting to get a little bit more independence which is lovely to see. Even though like all babies, they do sleep a lot, their playing moments are lasting much, much longer now and it's during these times that I sometimes wish I wasn't in the room as they do leave a trail of destruction in their path when they are having their mad moments.

Day 50 - September 13, 2005

None of today's entries are particularly long as I have been up all night with Sami's litter. Amaretto is still having spells where she leaves all the work up to Drambuie so she is only feeding the babies periodically. I guess in her mind that at 7 weeks of age, they should be eating like normal kittens now and not relying on her. The Chocolate Bars aren't doing too badly, as you know, their size is still bothering me. They're now on a worming course, and if necessary, I will put their vaccinations back a week or so until they are a bit bigger. This may mean that their new owners may have to wait an extra week or two for the babies but we will see what happens in the course of the next couple of weeks. They may surprise me and suddenly have a massive growth spurt but with the sort of luck I have, it's more likely that their legs will all fall off instead! (don't panic, I am only kidding, their legs won't fall off). I'm actually doing the diaries early today as with the 2 hourly feeding of the upstairs guys, everything needs to be done to a timetable so to speak. I will try and get some photos a bit later to add to the entries.

Day 49 - September 12, 2005 - 7 weeks old today!

Another week of our Chocolate Bars lives has now passed and they are at the stage where they are eating me out of house and home. Mind you, this is a good thing because while ever they are eating and being little terrors, it's always an indication that things are going well. Twix has now claimed the pyramid as his own and whenever other babies go in there, if he happens to be around at the time, he blocks the front hole in the pyramid and won't let the babies back out which is really quite funny to watch. For the first time in ages, I actually feel as if our Chocolate Bars are growing. I looked closely at the photos today and do think they are getting a bit bigger now. They are, however, still smaller than they should be at this age but the fact that they had been to hell and back for the first few weeks of their lives, they are all doing really, really well. Buttons is now the only Choccie Bar who is still a leg climber and when everyone else is sleeping, he will climb my legs and have a little snooze on my lap. This is always lovely, until I want to get off the chair.