Growing Like a Weed

I just wanted you all to know how little Elinore is growing. She had an appointment today! She weighs 11#4.5 and she's already 23.5" long! I can't keep up with her!

The Face that Launched a Thousand Ships

Funny, the name Elinore actually comes from "Helen". How will we ever keep her modest? 

Well all,

I have successfully made it back to school and after a very frustrating day of cleaning off files from my desktop, I have successfully done it. All I have to do now is load those files on to my laptop and get the Microsoft stuff from IT and all should be sugar and popsicles. I'm happy to be back at school!!

The Peanut Fairy

Sometime over dedication weekend, the peanut fairy visited our house. We discovered two whole unopened jars of peanuts!! I wonder how that happened... 

Peace

Lately, whenever we lay Elinore on her tummy, she falls asleep within five minutes. The other day she fell asleep on her playmat with her hand in her mouth. I think she is just such a picture of peace. 

These are the only photos I could get to download. The first one is of Shadow and me in July of 1990. She was just 8 weeks and I was four. The one of her staring into the fireplace is from New Years weekend. And the last picture is a picture from her last few hours at home.

Beginnings and Endings

Here is one of the pictures of Elinore from New Year's weekend.. (It's hard to post without a picture of the star of the family!)

On a sadder note, Shadow the kitty didn't improve after a few days of IV fluids. Laura was able to bring her home today and spend some time with her, but the vet made it clear that she was not feeling well and it was unlikely that she would last the night. We put it off as long as possible, but just before closing we took her back to the clinic so she wouldn't have to suffer anymore. We were all with her as she died, and it was very quick and seemed painless. She was a nice cat and had a good life, and it will seem strange without her. I'm sure she is already climbing trees and exploring the terrain in kitty heaven, but we will miss her.

Well, today has been a very black day. Over the weekend I noticed some changes in Shadow's behavior. She was more irritable and kind of grumpy. Then last night things just got really bad. She was staggering around, didn't want to be touched, she was very lethargic and then she was trying to use the litterbox and not able to. Plus she was really quiet and when she did meow it just sounded like she was hurting. The last two nights she hasn't slept in my room and this morning we made an appointment and took her to the vet. He took some x-rays and did some blood tests and told us he would call with the results this evening. I hoped it wasn't anything serious, my thought it might be a thyroid problem, like Pebbles. The vet called at 5:45 with some very bad news. He said Shadow has advanced kidney disease and her kidneys are starting to shut down. He told us we could bring her in and they would give her IV fluids to try and help her improve and get her to start eating again. Unfortunately her chances of improving aren't high, they're less than 50%. We're giving it 4 days on the IV fluids and if she does not improve we are going to bring her home and make a decision. As I'm sure you can imagine, I'm not taking this very well. Shadow is my baby and if she doesn't get better it's going to be real hard for me. I knew this was going to happen eventually, I just wasn't expecting it to happen so soon. Not a great way to start the year

Chrismanewyears

Little Ella bean is just too cute, and getting cuter every time we see her. It was a very merry belated christmas/a fun and happy new years. We can't wait to come next weekend!!