Another time, she went to the bathroom on the floor and we saw some weird stringy rubber looking thing in it. We have no idea what it was because no one wanted to probe and find out.

Now, Tishna has a strange lump on her side. It's small, probably only as big as a nickel and we have no idea what it is.

Chloë Máiréad, your cat is lovely (and I'm pokey saying this, but welcome to NarniaWeb! ) You ought to look up the Norwegian Forest Cat because that's what your kitty reminds me of.

Thank you.

I looked up Norwegian Forest Cats. It's quite possible that Gracey is part NFC. Except, she's not very large, she's not affectionate and she doesn't have a fluffy tail. But everything else about them sums her up. Essentially waterproof, double-layered coat. Tuffs of fur on her ears and between her toes. Longer hind legs. Loves the outdoors.

I can't really know for sure, though.

ramagut, that's sad that you have to get rid of some of your pets. I hope you will be able to find a place that will allow you to keep all of your cats. I would definitely allow people to have pets if I ever rent anything out. I think they are less destructive / noisy than some college students.

My mom and I came home today and found the door to the basement open part of the way. That door is always supposed to be closed. We don't let the cats go down there unless they are supervised because there is a lot they could get into in the basement. I saw Mystery in the living room. She was sitting straight and tall and looking at me with an innocence look that seemed to say "Who me? I know nothing about that open door and I certainly didn't go down to the basement." The only problem was that she had a huge cobweb on her head from ear to ear. The only place in our house she could have found a cobweb like that is in the basement, so we knew who had been in the basement. The other cats were clean and napping, so if they had ventured into the basement they were hiding it a lot better than Mystery.

Patterwigs Pal, I know what you mean by saying how cats freeze when they're at the vets. Our two, Cinnamon and Sugar, are angels when we take them out but when they're back in the car or at home it's quite the opposite when it comes to taking medicine or things alike.

On the subject of cutting claws:
When we had birds, we never cut their nails due to one accident we had when they had bled (it wasn't serious, but they *were* our first official pets and it *was* the first time we experienced that, so it was frightening.) They never got to the point of being tame enough to perch on our fingers and didn't kick each other or anything and the vet never insisted on it, so it didn't matter so much.
For our cats, we clip Sugar's claws occasionally and she doesn't make noise. It's actually harder to get a leash on her (when she's being stubborn) than it is to clip her nails, I've seen. I'm pretty cautious at clipping Cinnamon's nails so we haven't done it yet. (Most of the reason is because my mom and sister insist that she'll only be still in my hands, where as Sugar behaves in nearly anyone's, so they say I have to hold her and it's positively trying to sit there and watch her nails being clipped!) I'll definitely clip them when it gets unhealthy, but I doubt it's that now.
Does anyone know what good the little nail file for cats is? And how to use it?

My first dog was a dalmation, his name was Bongo (to me) because when I was one and I couldn't pronounce Pongo. My dad gave him to a neighbor when we moved. It was his dog and I don't really remember the dog that well but he is on some of my hoe videos.

My second dog I got him when I was four and he was a Golden Retriever. He died at the age of two having a tumor that grew back. His name was Buddy.

My third dog was a year after Buddy died. My dad got me a yellow lab puppy on my birthday. I named her buddy girl and i had her for ten years when I moved into an apartment and gave her to a sweet girl.

When I was 11 I got a kitten and named her Aimee. She was a black bombay. I only kept her for about eight months and I had to get rid of her because she was 100 percent feral and too hard to take care of.

A year and a half ago I rescued a beagle from a shelter on my birthday and I named him Caspian. He's by far the best pet. A lot of people didn't want him but he is most certainly house trained and know a lot of tricks as if he broke away from the circus. Super cute dog too and I still have him.

I might post pictures later of mabye Buddy, Buddy Girl, and Caspian.

Wow, that is big. What kind of height / length goes with that. (I'm not sure how dogs are measured.)

I wouldn't want a dog that size. It could do some serious damage to me. It doesn't help that I have a bit of a fear of dogs. When I was in about second grade a German Shepard broke its chain, knocked my neighbor off his bike, and came over and bit me on the shoulder. It was a puppy age wise but was full grown.

This morning when I was out talking to my neighbor, Fiona stood up with her front paws on the fence between us (She wanted to be petted by my neighbor), and her head is past my shoulders now. I'm about 5'5".

I can't blame you for not liking big dogs. Fiona however, is a lover. My husband and I often joke that if an intruder broke into our house, the only way she might protect us from him is if she jumped up on him, knocked him down, and gave him lots of kisses.

Can't decide if she looks more like a bear or a wolf. I call her my bear-wolf-dog.

And here she is tanking up out of the sprinkler. 99% of the time I get lots of kisses after this.

And I can't believe I haven't posted this one yet, but here's a FANTASTIC pic of my kitties. (Abi's in the back, Murky's in the front) My husband has informed me I'm entering this pic in the fair this year.

Fiona looks like a wolf. She's a very beautiful dog. My uncle has a dog like it but not as big.

*re-reads through the last few pages to get her "cuteness" fix*

Chloë Máiréad, we have a Manx too, who looks rather similar to Gracey, except more rectangle. If that makes any sense. His name is Quincy, and he's also one of the most skittish and fearful cats there ever was. I wonder if it's something about Manx? Anyway, he's gotten more friendly and relaxed since he's gotten older (he's 5 or 6). He's a very "tough" cat; he's had several really bad accidents, and managed to survive them all, although he still has a slight limp from his worst accident.

And FK, Fiona is sooo big and pretty!

FK Fiona looks so cute and very kissable

I got a new friend for Robin cause he was so very lonely without Alan with only his mirror for his friend

so..........meet Sophie!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

My sisters wanted to name her Lady Marian, to go along with Robin Hood, but...we already had a 'Marian' who later turned out to be Alan i.e. we thought it was a girl and later found out it was a boy, so I decided to name her Sophie. I thought it suited her better
She is sweet but has a real attitude. Right now she is still a bit wild becuase I only got her a week ago. Robby was really excited and pleased when we got her. She is extremely bossy though and has already succeded in taking Robby's sacred seat by his mirror. They often quarrel over who is going to sit next to it. Robby is not used to sharing his mirror at all because when Alan was with us he cared nothing for it. Now Robby has to learn to share his mirror, and Sophie wants it 24/7. We're thinking of getting another one to quiet them down a bit. Their arguments can be really loud. Sophie has also taken complete managment of the cage and runs everything by her schedule.
"That's what happens when you let a woman enter your life," my sister joked to Robby.
They get along great other than that though, it so cute to see them sitting together and cleaning each others feathers. I would put a picture up but they don't like me photographing them when they are having bath time.
One day Sophie decided that it was time to rearrange the household a bit

Robby was very unhappy with the arrangment and soon had her put it back the way it belonged

Today is a significant day because today Sophie took a flight around the room for the first time. We wanted her to stretch her wings yesterday but she was to shy and scared to come out. Robby looked so funny trying to coax her to fly out of the cage. Today she gingerly hopped out the door and after making sure that everything was safe she took off. They're sitting on the curtain rod right above me as I am writing this

I'm not much of a bird person myself, but I love hearing people talk about their birds. Sophie sounds like quite the firecracker wild rose. Fighting over the mirror I wonder if that's like couples fighting over the bathroom and the woman almost always wins.

So... 4:15am this morning I woke to a big crash of thunder followed shortly by the sound of hail. Not a huge deal here, I'm used to it. But I went sprinting out to the kitchen to make sure that Fiona was in her doghouse. She WAS in it, til she saw me coming and ran up to the door. It was hailing so I let her in. Then I went downstairs and crashed on the sofa. Of course laying down meant that I was immediately inundated with loads of slobbery puppy kisses. After a couple minutes she quieted down and flopped on the floor next to the couch and I thought "She's actually going to sleep!" But then, she saw Murky.

My husband and I have a joke, we call it Murky's Law. Murky's Law states that If Fiona is being a good puppy, Then Murky enters and Fiona will be a bad puppy.

Fiona gets up and goes trotting over to Murky. Hissing, spitting immediately follow. I get up and yell at Fiona and Murky and check the weather on the computer. I see that the worst of the storm has passed, Fiona gets booted back outside.

I go back to bed, Murky follows. And now we come to Murky's Second Law. Murky's Second Law states that If there is anything left out on the dresser in the bedroom or the counter in the bathroom, Then Murky has no choice but to knock it onto the floor or into the sink while we are sleeping.

So yeah, Murky immediately started batting SOMETHING around on the dresser. I got up again and grabbed him and tried to cuddle him in bed, but that only resulted in him jumping out of my arms and landing on my husband's face. I chucked him out of the room and closed the door, and went back to bed.

Abi jumped up on the bed and went to sleep on my feet. The End.

This morning when I was out talking to my neighbor, Fiona stood up with her front paws on the fence between us (She wanted to be petted by my neighbor), and her head is past my shoulders now. I'm about 5'5".

That confirms it your dog is probably going to be bigger than I am. I'm 5'2 She is cute though. I don't mind dogs in pictures. I'm not crazy about them in real life though.

I love your story about the storm night and Murky's Laws. Our cats are shut out of the way at night so they don't get into trouble. One night, my sister and her friend were painting Blitzen's room (Middle of the night when all sane people are in bed. ). Blitzen escaped and fled upstairs into my parents room and on to the bed. My sister was in hot pursuit. She was trying to catch Blitz before she woke my mom up. (My dad was out of town). It didn't work and Blitzen got to stay up. Myst and Shad occasionally get to stay out at night if my dad is out of town. (Some one needs to be around in case of bats ) They aren't too much of a problem, except Myst likes attention in the wee hours of the morning - around 5 I think.

Mystery and Shadow turned 10 on Monday.

Here's a picture of Shadow and Blitzen "sharing." My guess is that Blitzen muscled her way in next to Shadow.

I'm not that much of a cat person but for some reason I think cats look completely cute with mitten looking paws. Those are some adorable cats Pattertwig's Pal!

My kittens are almost all grown up. Why can't they stay little so we can keep them? At least I can still keep them for a couple more weeks. They have such great personalities that it feels like you're giving away one of the family.