We are 6 weeks old now!

Day 41 - October 11, 2007

Our Chefs have really amazed me during the past 24 hours. A couple of nights ago, in a moment of madness, I made the decision that the babies should be allowed freedom of the whole house (yes I am aware that our Chefs are not 6 weeks old yet!), and what I did not count on was that the Chefs would be brave enough to want to actually leave their room. At this age, they certainly should not have been venturing much further than the upstairs landing however during the past 48 hours I have seen James, Gary, and Gordon, all downstairs, Jamie and Antony have both been exploring upstairs, the bathroom, and have even been seen wrestling on the very bottom step. My problem is now that wherever I turn, I am seeing older babies and now tiny little babies. Sambuca and Amaretto are furious with me for allowing their babies to have more freedom and the first 24 hours that the door was opened, both mum's sat right in the doorway, guarding it, to try and stop their children leaving the room. Of course it was all to no avail and now even the mother's are sure half the time where all their children are.

Day 39 - October 9, 2007

I am extremely behind in kitten diaries as you can tell and there are no photos for today's entries. Over the weekend, Graham caught this awful flu that is going around, by yesterday morning I had the same thing, although I am recovering much quicker so by the time I did the floors and the usual cat chores yesterday I had run out of energy to do any kitten diaries. Tomorrow's diaries will have photos as per normal though.

At 5 1/2 weeks of age, I think we are winning the battle with Heston although that poor child must have such an inferiority complex. Remember how she started out life as a boy, and then after Teen visited, Heston turned into a girl? Well I've not actually really looked properly since then and I guess I should but the problem is despite her allegedly being female, I still constantly think of her as a boy and refer to her as a boy. None of our other babies' have changed sex although I do keep thinking I really must have a look at Antony, especially considering his weight which is only slightly more than Jamie and she is a definitely girl :) I don't really fancy having to explain to Amie, who is such a lovely lady, that her little boy is now female. Just like in the Ray J's kitten diary, I have remembered at long last to share the Chefs' weights with you and I am delighted to see that 4 of our Chefs actually weigh more than one of our Ray J's, something that I believe speaks volumes with regards to this litter and the health of the lines behind it.

Baby	Colour	Current Weight
Heston Blumenthal	Oriental Black	378g
Gordon Ramsay	Oriental Black	576g
Jamie Oliver	Cinnamon Oriental Classic Tabby	462g
James Martin	Seal Tabby Point Siamese	542g
Antony Worrall Thompson	Oriental Black	470g
Gary Rhodes	Seal Point Siamese	530g

You can tell by these weights that we do still have a very long way to go with Heston however her least weekly gain was 75 grams and I am more than pleased with that. Jamie is the one who surprises me because from the start, she was more petite than the other children, yet she is coming along nicely, well they all are to be honest. It is no surprise to me that Gordon is still our biggest child and for a while there, the battle of the largest baby was between James and Gordon but now Gordon is starting to really surpass James.

Day 36/37 - October 6/7, 2007

It was so lovely to meet Sue, Sue's husband (many apologies as I totally have forgotten your name), and Kelly and we really had a very enjoyable visit. Sue and her family currently have another fur child called Bentley and I was lucky enough to see a photo of him today and what a lovely boy he is. Actually Sue, it's quite sad that I remember your cats' name but not your husbands :) Gordon was the only baby who was prepared to wake up for a while and play when his visitors arrived so that was quite good timing. Although the temptation of the milk bar proved to much in the end and after quite a good feed, he promptly went back to sleep. Gordon is going to be quite a large boy and at this age he still has very big paws, he's also still a tad clumsy bless him.

Day 35 - October 5, 2007

The Chefs are still having a wonderful time in their new room and I have to say that I was rather shocked this morning to open up the kitten room door when I went in to give the babies their breakfast and there was not a single nugget anywhere on the floor. You'll remember that in the smaller kitten room, litter training was not going particularly well, and when the babies were moved into the big room, I was fully expecting to see quite a few accidents. I was really amazed to see both litter trays had been used. So now, having turned 5 weeks of age today, I am thrilled to bits that our Chefs are not only litter trained, but they are also weaned. It is so lovely to see all 5 babies come running to the plates at each meal time. If I had to pick one baby who eats, but not with as much interest as everyone else, it would be our Jamie. Today I was going to share weights with you but as I am now back downstairs desperately trying to get entries online (it's already 1617 and I'm only just starting them!), I just can not be bothered to go back upstairs to collect the weight chart but I will definitely do this tomorrow.