Our Other "Kids"

We have four pets in our house. Titus was the first to join our family and he's being elusive right now so no picture of him. He's an old tabby cat that we adopted from Petsmart about 9 or so years ago. He was a few years old when we got him, so he's an oldie. But a goodie :) He sleeps at the end of my bed every night and sometimes comes up near my head to snuggle. Grace likes to hunt him down and trap him in her room. Probably why he's being elusive right now. Titus is toothless. Well, he's lost his fangs. Poor guy. But he seems happy, so all is well.

Chloe was the next cat added.

She's all black and my guess is part Siamese. She's a vocal one. We adopted her from Four Paws Rescue. I wanted a kitten so we went to look at them, and as soon as she was out of her kennel, she was up on my shoulder and purring. I knew she was the one. She had ringworm when we adopted her so we had to quarantine her in our small half bath when we were at our old apartment. She would sit in there and meow. It was heartbreaking. Finally, we let her out and she snuggled up on my shoulder while I was in bed and since then, that's been her spot. At night when I'm reading in bed, she's usually on my chest, snuggling and purring. She's also a climber. She's usually on top of bookshelves, and our pantry. Maybe it's to escape the kids, but I think she likes to see what's going on. And she's a hunter. She'll track a fly and chirp at it, frustrating because she can't reach it. Mike calls her devil cat, and I honestly can't remember what started that. But she's my baby and always will be.

Sully was the last cat to join our family.

Again, me and my kitten dreams. Saw an ad in the paper for free kittens so we headed to Hyrum to check them out. This lady had cats everywhere. She said any time someone found a cat, they'd take it to her house and there always were pregnant ones, so she always had kittens. Of the litter, he was the cutest. He had an eye infection at time of adoption, but that cleared right up. He was a mischievous little thing, always climbing into boxes and attacking the other cats. He also was the king of the "sneak attack" at the end of the bed. You know, when you're lying in bed at night and your feet are slightly out of the covers. He'd jump up with his needle-like claws and attack. OUCH!

Those are our cats. They are all declawed and I bawled like a baby when we did it. But we had just moved into our brand new house and they were using our stairs as a scratching post. I'm glad we did it though because of the kids. And I don't think we'll ever have a cat again, at least not in the next 10-15 years, so I don't have to worry about going through that again.

And then we have our dog, Sally.

We had talked about getting a dog for a long time. Actually, that was part of the reason we built this house. We were going to get a husky puppy from my brother-in-law and our apartment at the time would not allow dogs. So we started looking for a house to rent that would allow pets. We ended up finding...nothing. Nada. Zilch. So we thought "Hey, we're young, and married, and it's about time we bought a house". 

So we went to a local realtor and blindly talked to a mortgage guy and were told we qualified for $180,000 home. We had no idea what we were doing. And next thing you know, we had signed a contract saying we'd use that specific realtor and only them. So they set us up with a brand new girl who started taking us around to see houses. Every house she took us to she'd comment on saying "Oh I should have bought this instead of fixing up my old house" or "oh this is so cute". She wasn't that helpful. In fact, one house we looked at had soot and damage in the kitchen so I asked if there had been a fire. She looked down at her paperwork and very surprisingly said "Oh, yes. Looks like a small fire on the stove, but really no damage." Actually, we did most of the searching for the houses. We'd scour the MLS listings online trying to find something we thought we could afford (wanted to stay under $130,000 if we could) and something in Logan since we both were working in Logan. 

We looked for a few months. We even put an offer in on a house, that actually is close by where we live now. They rejected the offer and asked for more. We said no. Then we wanted to put an offer on a different house, but our realtor talked us out of it. We had hit a dead end. At this point, the puppy was already gone, we were living month-to-month at our apartment and we were tired of looking at old, dirty houses. Then our mortgage guy suggested a contractor. Next thing you know, we were in the process to build. It was in our budget and we got to be specific about certain details like carpeting, siding, layout, etc. It was a good experience and honestly, if we ever decide we need a new house, we'll probably build again.

So back to our "kids" cause that was a major tangent. Moved in, had a kid. Then Mike decided it was time for a dog. We had a lawn by then. He and Grace hit up Petsmart during the Humane Society's Super Adoption weekend. I was working and got a text with a puppy in a photo. They had picked up Sally. She was listed at a Hound Mix, and we were imagining more beagle or something. Then I found out I was pregnant with Mercy and I did not want a dog anymore. We didn't have a fence, and she didn't listen to me. I was sick of the dog, so Mike put her up for sale on ksl.com. Then someone messaged him and said Sally was a Rhodesian Ridgeback. We looked it up and found out that they're a South African dog that is bred to hunt lions! Crazy. By that point, she had grown on me and we decided to keep her. After we got the fence put it, things have greatly improved. She's turned into a pretty good dog and I'm glad she's still around :)

She sleeps on a homemade doggy bed on the floor by my side of the bed. Whenever we have babies and they're in the co-sleeper there, she gets replaced and she doesn't like that one bit. But for now, and hopefully for a long time, she'll be on the floor next to me. She's a good dog.

And then we have our monkey:

Mercy snoozing in my bed.

The little sneak kicked Sally off her bed sometime in the middle of the night and was sleeping on the floor next to our bed. Mike moved her in with me when he left for work and that's where she still is. Silly girl. She doesn't like the pattern on our new sheets though. She must think something is spilled on them, cause she'll look at it all confused-like and say "I don't like that". Ha ha. I love this kid.