The kittens are doing well! I'm still in the process of uploading my huge backlog of photos, but I'll get to the kitten ones as soon as I can. In the meantime there are these photos that my mom took on her iPhone. The calico girl is Ramona Lee, and the tabby-and-white boy is Oliver Lee. (I've decided to give them surnames a la the itty bitty kitty committee, even though I'm probably the only one who cares what they are.)

After sampling the kitty litter and then playing in it, they did eventually use the actual litter box for, uh, littering. There haven't been any accidents on that front. They are also eating and drinking regularly, which is GOOD because lack of appetite is one of the major warning signs listed in my fostering packet.

They hate taking their medicine (eye drops and this weird liquid antibiotic that smells like onions), but the good news is they are getting better. Ramona's URI was never too bad, but poor little Oliver came to me with audible congestion in his lungs, and his frequent sneezing fits sounded something like a duck quacking. Two days later, he's sneezing much less, there are no lung sounds anymore, and I'm pretty sure he's already less scrawny and more steady on his feet than he was when he arrived. He has a HUGE appetite, so hopefully he'll catch up to his sister in terms of size and hardiness soon enough. I wish I had a scale to weigh them. I'm so happy he's getting better.

I am a little worried about Ramona, though, because she's not very social with people. She's calm if you pick her up, but she never seems to seek out human affection, never purrs or wants to be petted. She's way more interested in chasing Oliver around. She seems to think my fingers are for eating, not for petting. Part of my job is to socialize them, but I'm not sure what to do if she just doesn't want to be social. I don't want to force petting on her, but they're six weeks old, and the first seven weeks are key for socialization. Then again, I have known kittens whose grown-up personalities were the exact opposite of their kitten personalities, so who knows.

The hardest part of all this is Hypatia. She HATES being shut out of the kitten room (my bedroom, where she likes to sleep), and she hates that I spend so much time in there. Kate has been giving her extra attention, but I don't know what to do tonight, because Kate is dog-sitting for her sister, so I have to decide whether to sleep in my own bed near the kittens or on the couch so Hypatia doesn't get lonely. The kittens would probably be fine without me, but I do like sleeping in my own bed.

Tomorrow is Nathan and Bridget's wedding! Yay! Mawwiage!

eta: Muskego? You fail, location detector.