Miss Leia's first visit to the vet.

A quick snap left me with a grainy photo.  Sorry.

Leia's now 10 1/2 months old.  We've had her for a month and a half.  Between her skittishness when we first got her to the dreadful cold, today was the first time that seemed practical to take her.

Baby thing did not enjoy going back into a box.  After placing her in the cat carrier, I walked out of the room for a few minutes.  There was a ruckus and she was trying everything she could to open the door.  I placed the carrier on the front seat next to me, had kitty hand holding mine for a little bit of the drive, then she resigned to traveling, laid down and settled in for the drive.

When she came to us, she was 5 1/2 pounds.  She is now 8.1 pounds.  She was overly thin and I think that a chunk of that was that she did not enjoy being kitty-in-a-box.  The box stressed her out and she didn't enjoy being fishbowl kitty.  She has just now become comfortable enough to use the litter box in our presence.  There were a few accidents in the beginning because she was scared to death to use the loo when we were around.

Just in the last week and a half, she has become very comfortable with being upstairs.  Just today, she was investigating the couch and enjoying watching out of big window in the front storm door.

The only real concern we've had about her is that (I apologize for the detail) she is cow pie kitty.  I've thought all along that the food may be causing upset due to pies and odor, and brought it up to the vet.  She checked out as healthy all the way around, but he suggested that though she had a wormer, there could be a little something in there that wouldn't have been covered by the worming meds.  I opted for the test to rule that out and it came back negative.  :wipes of the forehead:  We went on to discussing food.  Though she seems to love the taste of her current food, Purina Pro Plan, I wanted his take.  We talked about how Smudge had eaten Royal Canin Urinary SO and though I would be more than happy to skip the $60/bag of cat food, if Leia would need a similar diet, we would do what we needed to do.  He suggested Science Diet or Royal Canin.  I discussed the adoption facilitator talking with us about Wellness and he said it would be excellent.  He wants Leia to have a high protein and low carb diet.  When they took Leia for the test for worms (ick) I went on and hunted down bags of cat food.

Wellness won.  The bag that I purchased is grain-free and looks like a delightful sum of things that I don't at all mind giving to my critter.

Right now, we are on the 50/50 split with food.  She ate it and seemed to like it really well.

She knows where K's room is and stands outside the door, waiting for a piece of yarn to fly out to her.

She has nosed her way through our room.

After a bit of a fright while investigating the table a few weeks ago, she learned that the food surfaces are not places for kitties to be.  (I tried to pick her up off the table. She ran, flew up onto the counter, spun herself around and went straight to the basement.  It was like racetrack kitty!)

She talks and talks.  She was having a conversation with K the other day.

I've seen her use her kitty opposable thumbs to pick crayons out of K's crayon carousel and go running through the basement with them.  No kidding.  She picked them up, placed them in her mouth and went running.

Oh, and how her motor runs.  I can tell you that her motor was not running today when she was at the vet.  I can also tell you that she was a bit miffed at me, but she seems to have been brought back around.  (I hand fed her vittles, which restored her trust.)

The vet's office?  They loved her.  A good kitty Leia is.  How happy we are that she is here!