Our Planets all now eat dry kitten biscuits which is great. During the last 24 hours I've seen them all eating from the biscuit bowls, even Mars. Their weight gains are all steady and on the whole, the babies are doing quite well. I thought yesterday afternoon we had gained another Planet when in fact Tia Maria was doing her usual "motherly thing". The cat scratch pole that resides in the back room had a black furry toy on it and at some point in time yesterday morning either Tia Maria or the babies have pulled it off and started chewing it. Anyway, when the babies were all sound asleep yesterday afternoon, Tia Maria got off the bed, walked over to wear the black furry thing was, picked it up and took it back to the bed. She then proceeded to put the toy in amongst the babies who were sleeping and started to groom them all one by one, including the toy! I am surprised that with the 8 babies she and Sami already have between them, that she would want to add to the litter number. Of course, didn't I look like a fool this morning when I had I put the plates of food down for the babies breakfast, and 3 of the Planets were sitting up on the bed and couldn't be bothered to move so I picked them up, one at a time and placed them in front of the plates where they promptly started eating. I went back for the 3rd baby only to discover it wasn't a baby at all and I was about to pick up the black furry toy.

This is not much of an entry today as most of my day was spent in the back yard mowing the jungle and I simply must ask this. If any of you who are reading this diaries know where I can buy a replacement metal blade for a Challenge petrol mower, can you please email me? I'd really appreciate it. A slight change in the Planets weights which surprised me and that is Neptune has now overtaken Venus in the weight department. Neptune used to be the second smallest baby in the litter however she's been eating so very much and now weighs more than Venus. I am pleased that I took photos this morning before I did the mowing because otherwise there would be nothing to put in this entry at all.

I lost Venus yesterday for a brief period of time. Well not quite lost as I knew where she was but it was a more a case of me waiting to see if she came out by herself or whether or not I should rescue her. As they have had the run of the house for a little while now, as each day passes, they get braver and explore more areas and the Planets went out into the front hallway. Venus decided to see if she was small enough to stuff herself between a wall unit and a bookcase and sure enough, she managed to do it. Tia Maria and Sambuca were hanging around trying to encourage her out but she was having none of it. I left her for about 5 minutes and then decided enough was enough and I removed the books from the bookcase so that I was able to get one arm through the gap to get her out. Fortunately, she was more than willing to oblige. I must say that there was a definite look of relief in Sami & Tia's eyes to see their baby returned to them. Apart from that one incident though, the Planets are thoroughly enjoying exploring the house and unlike the Musketeers, they are not phased by Sheridans at all when he growls at them. Being a typical boy, he's trying to assert his dominance over these tiny creatures and while it is working with the Musketeers who are running scared, The Planets couldn't care less. Neptune in particular is fascinated by Sheridans and tries to follow him around which annoys him a little because it's very hard to look like a big ferocious lion trying to prove your manhood with a little black girl right on your heels tripping you up wherever you go :)

This would almost have to be the first time since the The Planets were born that we have photos of actual babies and not just blobs. As you can tell by some of the photos, they do enjoy playing on their little pyramid and trying to knock each other off the top of it. Late yesterday afternoon, I was delighted to see Mars eating dry kitten biscuits. It's the first time he's ever done this. He wasn't eating them from the bowl though, he was eating all the biscuits that had fallen back into the tray. (we sit 2 bowls of kitten biscuits on a tray because the babies are messy when they are learning to eat biscuits and this way they don't end up scattered all over the floor). The back room door was opened up again yesterday so our other cats could visit the Planets and also access the cat run and we'll be doing the same again today. Not that the little Planets actually wander anywhere too far, usually just to the other side of the door, have a look and then they come running back in. Naturally, this intrigues all of our other cats who are very fascinated by these little creatures that run about and talk so much.

I really had to giggle yesterday afternoon at Mars. Jupiter had accidentally pushed her off the bed (the bed is simply vet beds on the floor), and Mars rolled off. He picked himself up, started to walk back into bed when Neptune was there to greet him. Ever time Mars tried to take a step, Neptune, being the kind girl that she is, bit him on the ear. So he was taking one step forward and then one step backwards and then trying to sidestep her. Eventually, Neptune just gave him one almighty shove and yep, Mars rolled off the vet bed again. When I finished laughing, I did pick him up and put him back in the middle of the other babies and that certainly worked as Neptune then went and jumped straight on top of Jupiter who was sound asleep and not appreciative of her sisters' antics. At long last Mars has finally got the hang of eating from the plate and I no longer have to spend any time trying to encourage him. All I have to do now is simply put him on the floor in front of the plate and straight away he starts eating which is fantastic. He's still our smallest baby in the litter and oddly enough, Jupiter, one of the girls, is the largest! She has totally overtaken Saturn in the weight department so I do think she is going to be a very big girl.

Last night was so very funny because I came downstairs at 10:30pm to feed the babies their "wet" meal for the night and when I came into the back room, the Planets were all sitting up/half lying on their beds but they weren't sure of what they wanted to do so I lay down on the floor with them and started to sing to them while I stroked their ears. They came closer to me and then lay down in front of me and started to close their eyes. I kept singing to them (goes to show that they obviously are hard of hearing because I couldn't sing to save my life!) and wouldn't you know it, they all fell asleep within minutes. I'm presuming that they didn't want their dinner anyway. It was really lovely though and I do enjoy those special bonding times that I have with our little ones. Our Planets are getting very daring now and are trying to climb up everything they see. I had a bit of a surprise yesterday when I saw Venus half way up the ironing board. The ironing board was standing, folded up on it's end, and the little minx had scaled it by climbing along the cover! I don't think she gave any thoughts whatsoever as to how she would actually get back down. The other thing they now do is try to prevent the humans from leaving the back room to do into the rest of the house. When they are awake, if we walk towards the door the babies go running over to it and stand there on their back legs and put their front paws up on the door, as if to say "Let us out too". They are obviously trying to tell us something. Apart from that, they are doing everything that is normal for this stage of their lives and they are very adorable when they're playing.

I can't believe our Planets are now 5 weeks old and am wondering where the time is going. As usual, it's simply flying by and the babies are maturing and developing right before my eyes. Little Mars is making slow and steady weight gains and is equally as active as the rest of the litter but still prefers mum's milk to the weaning mixture. The babies are very active now during the times when they are awake. They run all over the room and have now started to play with the little toy mice which have been available to them for the last week. None of them have become possessive over the toys yet and are still happy to share them with each other. They are also now gaining an interest in the spider that hangs down near their beds and a few of them have been seen patting it to make it swing. At this point in time though there favourite toy is the little blue pyramid and each other. Wrestling games still go on constantly and every now and then you hear a little squeal when someone has played a bit too rough and then either Sambuca or Tia Maria go over to sort out the problem.