On February 15, 2010, our garden looked like this:

The snow was deep. So deep that MrC and I couldn’t get to work the next day. We actually got stuck in front of our house in his 4-wheel-drive truck. Ridiculous!

Fast forward a month and four days later: (aka March 19, 2010)

and MrC and I were outside burning off the rest of the garden. There was 3 back-to-back days of no rain which allowed the ground to dry up just enough for us to till.

We managed to get three passes done with the tiller before we ran out of gas. That was plenty for the chickens though. They thought it was Christmas morning!

We got a small area fenced off and got 2.5 rows of onions planted. This is the earliest we’ve gotten onions planted. Normally we procrastinate or hum and haw about what day we should till and then suddenly it’s May and we’re finally getting our onions planted.

And a little over a week later, we started to see onions sprouting up:

I’m really excited for our garden this year. Of course I probably say that ever year, but this year it’s ME pushing MrC to get things planted instead of him saying “We should probably plant these soon.”

In other not-so-good news:

This cute little thing is the kitten that someone dropped off months ago. We actually caught it once and put it in a cage and it was FURIOUS. And I knew that if we took it to the humane society they would put it down for being unadoptable. So we freed it,  started feeding it and I attempted to get it just a little more friendly. It doesn’t run away when we get close to it, but it won’t let us touch it. It did, however, prove to be a great hunter. Even with an unlimited amount of food available, MrC and I are constantly finding moles and mice laying around the yard.

Let me stop here and say that I KNOW how important it is to spay/neuter your pets. Four of our 5 animals are adopted! I’ve volunteered at humane societies and animal shelters. I see what happens to unwanted pets and it breaks my heart.

So my goal was to get to the point where it was used to us touching it and get it taken to the vet and get neutered. Because from the close encounters I had with it, I could tell it was a male.

Then one day, two other cats showed up. “Odd,” I thought. But just chalked it up to them wanting to get something to eat. Then two days later, I looked out my window and one of the wandering cats was mating with our cat.

I’ll admit I cussed at this point.

B/c I’m pretty sure that the female is always on bottom. Which is exactly where our cat was.

So the cute little cat you see in the above picture? Is now pregnant. She’s actually a couple weeks pregnant and her belly is starting to get big.

Sigh.

I feel HORRIBLE. I should’ve known! I should’ve thrown her in the cage and trucked her to the vet AS SOON AS WE FOUND HER. But she is still so young! I had no idea how limited my time was.

Keeping the kittens is not something we can do. We’re renting our house and with 3 cats, 3 dogs, and 15 chickens, we’re already pushing our limits. But I’m hoping that she has them in the garage and maybe I can handle them enough to where they are friendly and find good homes for them. Don’t get me wrong, if I can’t find homes, they’ll stay with us (over the protests of MrC, of course) but that’s not the ideal situation!

Argh!

SPAY AND NEUTER YOUR PETS! And if you want a kitten and you’re in the Southern Indiana area, let me know!