Well Amaretto has been very busy every evening in our bedroom, looking for somewhere to give birth so I do think it must be time that I set up her kitten box (and Tia Maria's as well!). The babies have been moving around now for the past 2 weeks which is really lovely although they are making Amaretto slightly uncomfortable now. She does carry the extra weight well though and even this close to the birth, she is still quite active. The heat has been affecting her though during this last week and quite a lot of her time during the day she has been found sprawled out upstairs on the floor, or sprawled out on the stairs which does make it difficult when walking around the house as we constantly have to step over her. As she is getting so close now, she is also becoming more clingy and very attention seeking from Graham and myself. She is constantly coming up to us to sit on our laps or to have cuddles. On the whole though, she is extremely relaxed about the whole situation. We're still hoping and praying that one of these little babies will be an Oriental Blue girl and I have been whispering this to her for weeks now so hopefully she will oblige. It is entirely possible that this will be the last entry in her pregnancy diary, however, if she doesn't go into labour by Monday, there will be one more entry.

Well as you can tell from the photos below, Amaretto is doing really well. I'm going to be interested to see how many she has because Tia Maria is due the exact same day as Amaretto yet she is twice as big as Retto. Mind you, Amaretto had 6 babies in her last litter and I don't remember her being overly huge (would really have to re-read her previous diary to see). She was having cuddles with us last night up in the bedroom and Graham and I were saying that if only our house was full of "Retto's". Out of all the cats we have, she is the most placid, laid back, loving girl who never starts arguments and is happy just to be loved. Already, Graham is choosing names for his Oriental blue baby girl which could be tempting fate. Her appetite has increased a bit now and she's very active which I do like to see at this stage of the pregnancy so it would appear that everything is going well. She's still not overly fussed on all our current babies in the house, but she's much more tolerant of them now than she was a week or so ago.

It looks like we can now confirm that Amaretto is definitely pregnant as she did pink up, right on cue. Mind you, about 2 weeks into the pregnancy I had a feeling she was because she had a sudden temperament change and had increased her appetite. For the first couple of week's throughout most of our queen's pregnancies, they can become very cranky and very hormonal and this has certainly been the case with Amaretto, much to the disgust of our other cats and babies. So far though, everything is going according to plan and we're happy with the way her pregnancy is so far progressing although we still have a long way to go. Even though she is rather bad tempered at the moment, we still constantly find her curled up with Drambuie and our 2 older babies on a regular basis when she's sleeping so it's nice to know that she hasn't totally alienated everyone in the household.

Firstly, let me say that there are definitely no Honeymoon Photos this time around because while Amaretto and Ice were having fun and games, I have my hands full with my current 2 litters (The Planets & the Three Musketeers). Anyway, I thought it would be a nice change for them both to actually enjoy each other's company without the intrusion of "my camera and I". We did actually hum and hah about mating Amaretto again just now because for half of April and the whole of May, she called extremely often and having been through the Pyometra scare with Cacao we were simply not prepared to take a chance on Amaretto not having a similar problem. She is in excellent health at the moment and lovely condition and we do believe she is more than ready for another litter. Had there been even the slightest doubt in our minds, we would have waited a while longer. I can say though that it has not been any quieter in the house since Amaretto went on her honeymoon because Drambuie is also in full call and we are holding off mating her until June at the very earliest, and Tia Maria has been calling non stop off and on for the last 3 weeks now as well. I think that in our house, the only 2 people happy about this whole calling lark are Ice and Amaretto. I did have to giggle at Amaretto though because prior to being put in with Ice, she was so desperate for a man that she even went sniffing around poor Sheridans who doesn't even know what the word honeymoon means yet as he's so young and he was quiet confused by Amaretto's rolling actions that were taking place before his eyes. Although I must admit that even at this tender young age, Sheridans has a lovely set of crown jewels on him which will hopefully bode well for his future duties as a stud cat ;) Anyway, back to Amaretto. This was definitely yet another quiet honeymoon in the respect that Amaretto is our only breeding queen who doesn't scream when being mated and unless you actually witness the matings, you wouldn't know anything had even taken place. With all our other queens, you can hear them a mile off. Our next step now will be to wait another 3 weeks (approximately June 12) to see if she pinks up. Then the next question naturally is..............will she or won't she give us the Oriental Blue girl we've been waiting for to add to our breeding family?