Introducing Oliver

Where have I been for two weeks?  What have I been doing?  If you guessed "new kitten" you would be correct!  This post is about my cat, so bail out now if you are looking for quilting information, just sayin'.

With absolutely no plans whatsoever to even think about a new cat until perhaps in the spring when my first teaching trip is completed, when the cold and snow will be gone, and kittens are being born and needing homes---- what do we do but succomb to the charms of this little guy.

He is from the Wisconsin Humane Society where my husband had a bit of time before a meeting there and strolled through the cat condos and made eye contact with this charmer, named Oliver.  After a phone call with all the details, I said let's think about bringing Oliver home, they sent me photos and the rest is the gentle but compelling slide into new cat mom-hood. 

We brought him home after I spent a day vainly trying to cat proof the house, and he was a burst of pure joy in our lives.  He radiated energy and happiness. His purring is so loud you can hear it across a room.  He has springs in his legs.  He is a cat pretzel.  Anything and everything is entertainment. 

He is 6 months old, was surrendered because his first owner had health problems and could not care for him, and now he is our sweet and mischievous little cat, playing hard, sleeping it off, eating and playing once again, spending lots of time on my lap.

We have had geriatric cats for the last 6 years or so and before that mature cats, so all the ways of a young one are coming back to me!  How can they be so inventive, get into so much trouble, be so darn cute???

Yesterday, after a week here, I opened the sewing room door, the room to the forbidden city.  I had thought it was clean for him, but of course he could jump on the cutting table, pull the pins off the samples and notes on the wall and then kill with great delight anything he managed to knock down. 

I thought I had swept up all the loose threads.  How can he fit behind things in the narrowest places and come out with threads hanging? 

He loves to lie on the foot control of my sewing machine.  I see trouble brewing in that department.

All my pins, pincushions, threads, bobbins, are now in drawers.  He did knock over my little bottle of oil and kitty hockey it all over the room before I rescued it, lid still intact.  Whew.

His favorite is a label that was wrapped around a bundle of Cherrywood fabrics, see photo below.  It skitters nicely around the hard surface floors in our house.  He carries it around in his mouth, then drops it and proceeds to kill it, on the bed, under a chair, in the shower.  He takes it upstairs to play with, then downstairs.  Thanks Cherrywood for the great label, you could market it as an expensive cat toy!

He is beautiful.  His fur is short and like velvet.  He is a combination of our Hillary and Arnie in looks and temperament, naughty, but mellow and sweet and spunky.  He is smart as a whip.  He knows everything already, our routines, the name of the UPS guy, when the mail comes, what dogs go by on their walks. 

His litter is in the laundry room, his room now.  He was raised well, and yes he now jumps up on the kitchen island, but he is aware he is being naughty.  A raised eyebrow and he is down from there fast.

We are smiling, we love him, today I am going to try and quilt.  I think I might wait for his afternoon nap.

My trip is coming up fast to Asilomar in CA, for Empty Spools Seminars.  I have things organized, know what I'll teach, have samples, so if you are in my class there, do not worry, I will still remember how to quilt.  I'm so looking forward to my time there as usual, and know we are going to have a wonderful class.

If you have questions, please ask, and if I have any more info for you in the next two weeks I will post it here on my blog.

Meanwhile, keep on quilting, your work gets better every day!

Diane