Chances are that you will have noticed in the last couple of days that the Pints kitten diary is not going online until a bit later than usual. The reason for this is that I had forgotten how time consuming it is to do 2 kitten diaries at the same time. My aim is to have the diary online by 11am at the very latest. I was relieved to see that our Pints had very good weight gains last night because as it was the first night with 2 sets of babies in the same room, I was concerned that the mum's would have moved the children around and that they wouldn't have spent as much time in the box with them as they normally would. Obviously this was not the case and each time I went into the kitten room during the night, and even this morning, both mum's were in their own boxes paying absolutely no attention to each other's babies. None of our Pints were particularly happy this morning when I woke them up at 8am to weigh them and I can't say that I blame them as they were sound asleep. Even when I deposited them back in the box, they didn't even really wake up apart from either Caffreys or XXXX (it's still quite difficult to tell them apart at the moment and there is only a few grams difference in their weights) who as you can see kept looking up at the camera. They are so incredibly sweet at this age and so extremely vulnerable. At this age of their lives, all the Pints really want out of life is their mum, their milk, warmth and comfort, although I did happen to see Guinness scrambling towards the opening in the kitten box last night so it may not be too long before our babies are trying to get out of the box.

Our Pints are still doing really well and I'm struggling to believe that in a couple of days' time they will actually be 2 weeks old! I don't know where the time is going but already it's passing by way too quickly for my liking. Sometimes I just want them to stay tiny babies forever. Today's photos are rather boring sorry as the Pints were much more interested in sleeping than they were in having their photo taken. What didn't help also is that Amaretto refused to get out of the box so I could take photos as she was sitting right at the front of the box keeping an eye on Drambuie and her babies in their box. Yes, the Pints now have room mates although so far, fortunately, the mum's and their respective children are sticking to their own "houses". All 3 babies made very good weight gains again last night and I'm so very happy with their progress. As for colours, don't get me started. In some photos, Caffreys and XXXX look like they are getting Seal ears, however, their tails are most definitely leaning towards Chocolate. I personally would be betting that they both end up as Chocolate Points so it will be interesting to see how they develop. It was very difficult trying to explain to Graham prior to the babies being born that there was no way we could have an Oriental Blue in there as Sheridans is the dad.

A few weeks ago I had decided that this year would be the year that I actually cooked for the mums and their babies. Up until now, Graham, who is the chef in our home, has always done the cooking for the fur kids, i.e. the scrambled egg, the cooked chicken etc. and I've never done any of it for one simple reason.............I do not know how to cook! When you're lucky enough to have a husband who is a tremendous and imaginative cook, there is absolutely no motivation at all to even want to learn how to cook. So anyway, yesterday afternoon I decided that now was the time and I made Graham show me how to make scrambled eggs as I wanted to give some to Amaretto. You can just imagine how impressed I was with myself when in under 2 minutes I had made her some beautiful scrambled eggs. You can also imagine just how disappointed I was when I presented her with my first culinary dish only to have her give it a lick and then get back into the box to feed the Pints :) I left the plate in there just in case she decided to change her mind and I was feel rather proud when I went back into the kitten room a while later to discover that she had eaten the eggs. Well either that or she buried them somewhere totally unbeknownst to me! Anyway, on to our Pints as that is really the reason this diary is being written (and hopefully read). I explained to our Pints today, not that I think they were that interested, that it is entirely possible they will soon be getting some relatives to share the kitten room with them as Drambuie's due date was yesterday. At the moment my time is being alternated between the Pints, being with Drambuie, and trying to get the odd bit of work and housework done. The eyes are progressing even further now as you can hopefully tell by the photos. Even Guinness' eyes are almost fully open now now. This stage of life for the babies is such a wondrous time because their senses are starting to all come together and day by day they are changing. Every time I go into the kitten room if the babies are asleep, when I open the box and talk to them and stroke them, their little ears wiggle backwards and forwards so they are becoming much more aware of me which is lovely.

I'm really pleased to see that our babies' eyes are now opening up. Caffreys is leading the way with one eye fully open and the other eye partially open. XXXX has both eyes partially open and Guinness is a late bloomer :) Again today, XXXX and Caffreys both weigh exactly the same and Guinness is just 19 grams behind them so they are doing extremely well in the weight department. XXXX got a bit lost this morning and she decided to have a little stroll (well a crawling stroll) around the box and she headed straight for one of the back corners. The problem she than had was that no matter how hard she pushed her head against the box, she couldn't actually go any further so her legs were going up and down but she stayed in the same spot. I think it took her about 2 minutes to realise that she can't walk through cardboard so it finally dawned on her that she should turn her body around and head off in a different direction. They are so adorable at this age and you can almost see the look of impatience on their faces when they are trying to get somewhere but can't get there fast enough because their limbs are developed well enough yet.

It's difficult to believe that our Pints are 1 week old already as it seems like it was only yesterday that they were being born. Even in this short time they have grown and devloped so much. I'm very happy to say I was right and each of our Pints has doubled their birth weight which is wonderful news. It's not a particularly long entry today as I'm rather tired because Drambuie had a restless night which means that we did as well. As you can tell by the photos below (hopefully) our Pints are becoming more active and they are much more determined as well. When I changed their bedding this morning and weighed them and put them back in the box, they decided it was a good time to really give their little muscles a workout. For the next 20 minutes they pretended that they were mountain climbers and that the baby closest to them was Mount Everest. It really is so funny to watch them climb over each other. Once their eyes are open it will be so much better because they will be able to actually see where they are going, and then I have no doubts at all that they'll be doing laps around the kitten box.