After reading many beautiful and heartwarming articles written by mothers and daughters about Mother's Day, I wanted to share some of the photos and stories of animals I've seen around the world taking care of their young.  Some of you know that I've been involved in animal rescue for many years and have a soft spot in my heart for all animals.  I am always amazed at how protective and caring animals are of their offspring.

  I really wanted to write a post in honor of all mothers and especially those that are often overlooked on Mother's Day each year.  If you have pets you are a mother they could not survive without you!  I wrote a similar post about animal mothers and their offspring for mothers day a couple of years ago.  One of my readers was very grateful that I had posted it.  Sadly not humans have a mother at all or one that they are close to. 

My husband and I have also taken in several stray pregnant cats.  We found homes for all of the babies and mothers including the seven orange ones in the second photo down.  We actually kept the mothers - Princess (the black cat) and Peaches (orange cat) for ourselves. 

The monkeys that I saw at the Monkey Forest in Ubud, Bali we're so fun to watch.  The babies were so cute and well taken care of by their mothers.   I thought this mother was showing tremendous patience with her little one.
Here is a mother monkey feeding her baby what appears to be some coconut:
I saw many elephant mothers with their babies in the Serengeti National Park while in Tanzania:


Although I love all animals, I'm normally a little afraid of horses because they are so big.  I did see this mother and baby last month while I was visiting a park in Belize.
Here is a lion with its pride in the Serengeti of Tanzania:

Here is a penguin family I saw on an excursion in Punta Arenas, Chile on my way to Antarctica a few years ago.  This Family is in their borough (home).  One thing I learned about penguins on this trip is that they mate for life.
Here is a mother and baby sea lion nursing that I saw it last summer at an aquarium in Curacao:
I saw this litter of puppies in Alaska about two years ago when I went dog sledding on the Mendenhall glacier:
Here is our cat peaches with her seven one week old kittens.  We took peaches in when we were alerted by a rescue organization that she was lying next to a dumpster nursing her seven one week old kittens.  We kept her in a bathroom away from our other cats until we were able to take her to a vet the next day when we learned that peaches was FIV positive (Feline Immunodeficiency Virus) which meant she could not be around our cats as it can be spread to others.  We had to wait until the kittens were older before we could test them.  Only two of the seven turned out positive. 

I was able to find a home for them with a friend who lived hundreds of miles away in Kansas City.  We did purchase a new drug called T-cyte in hopes that treating the kittens while they were very young would make them turn F IV negative.  Miraculously the drug worked and the kittens are very health healthy and are no longer F I V positive.  Peaches is probably about seven years old now. 

Peaches is kept healthy getting a shot every six months of T-cyte which costs about $60 dollars a month.  Although she needs to be kept in an area of our home away from her other cats, we adopted another F I V positive cat named Piney who is also being treated with T-cyte and is also very healthy.  You can learn more about T-cyte which has helped cats with FeLV as well here.

Here is a family of Sand Hill cranes that live in our neighborhood in Florida.  The babies grow up very quickly but the mother and father stay with them until they are full grown.  As you can see there is a photo of one of the parents feeding a baby.  I apologize for this not being a good photo but I didn't want to get very close to them and upset the parents.  The last photo of these birds was taken only 30 days after the first two so you see how fast they grow.

Although these iguanas I saw in Mexico are not furry and cute likes some of the other animals I've shown you, I thought it was a cute picture of what appears to be a mother iguana with her baby:
Although this is not a great photo of a mother giraffe with two babies that I saw in the Serengeti national Park I thought I would share it:

 Lastly I wanted to share some photos of our cat Princess.  We found her in a junkyard about nine years ago when she was less than a year-old so she was basically a kitten herself.  It was obvious she was very pregnant so we took her in.  Princess said probably lived in that junkyard her whole life and was very feral and scared of humans.  Once she had her three kittens she was a very good mother and very protective of her babies.  We were very grateful to find good homes for all of her kittens when they were a few months old.  Princess still lives with us and is a very sweet cat that causes no trouble and no one would ever guess that she spent the first part of her life in a junkyard and was feral as a young cat.

 Do you have any special animal stories to share for Mother's Day or a soft spot in your heart for them like I do?  

Thank you for stopping by my little corner of the internet.  I would love to hear any comments or questions that you have.  I hope that you have a wonderful Mother's Day however you decide to celebrate it.

~Michelle

One of my main goals for 2016 was to take some photos of my cats that I am proud of.  I wrote about it on this post.  I will be honest with you, it's it's not been as easy as I thought it would be.  Cats move very quickly and some of mine our seemingly camera shy.  The above photo of my oldest named Chanel (a Himalayan Persian rescue cat) is especially camera shy so I was happy to get this shot of her.

The title of this post " Draw Me Like One of Your French Girls" was taken from the movie "The Titanic" .  This movie came out in 1997.  It's hard for me to believe it is almost a twenty-year-old movie as people still watch it a lot nowadays.

As you can see Fleur LOVES the camera.  She seems to like posing in front of flowers.  She was found in a flower bed when she was only a few weeks old almost 9 years ago.  We took her in as a foster cat around that time.  I think after nine years she will be with us for good ;)

 Here is another of my "foster" cats named Peanut.  He will be 10 years old this fall.  I'm grateful that he is not very camera shy either!

And here is peanut again while I am practicing with a new Focus type lens that I've been having a tough time learning to use:

Here are some of my very camera shy kitties.  The black one is named Princess and is about nine years old.  The Siamese looking one is named Sasha who just turned six.  The Tortoiseshell cat is named Piney.  Piney is FIV positive and about  four years old.  She is kept healthy with a fairly new drug the few people know about called T-cyte.  Many people ask me if it is expensive.  It costs us about $60 dollars each time she gets a shot which is about twice a year.  

 Here is peaches sporting her lion cut.  She is normally very fluffy so we get her groomed during the summer because it's so hot here in Florida.  Peaches is also FIV positive. We took her in more than two years ago when she was found nursing seven two week old kittens next to a dumpster.  We took her to the vet the next day and learned she was F I V positive.  Only two of the kittens tested FIV positive, but after six doses of T-cyte when they were very young they became negative.  T-cyte truly is a miracle drug in my opinion.

We don't know peaches exact age.  All of our cats are rescues so we don't know most of their exact birthdays.  The only one we know for sure is our oldest who is pictured at the top she was born in her foster home on May 29, 2004.

Lastly I will leave you photos of Elizabeth and Jasmine.  They are sisters who are approximately 10 years old.  Elizabeth, pictured first, looks like she got into my eyeliner.  They were the first foster cats that we took in.  They were very lucky to survive as they were found in a barn in the middle of the winter in Ohio.  Their mother had been stepped on by a horse.  Luckily they are happy and healthy cats now. 

I think Jasmine tries to make me feel guilty when I'm packing to go out of town :)

Thank you so much for stopping by to see my first kids.  I will continue to work on their portraits throughout 2016 and beyond.  I would love to hear your comments and advice on taking pictures of pets.  As always you can use my photo for free using my Pixabay account here.  I hope you all have a wonderful week!

~Michelle

 We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.
Immanual Kant 

During the first week in April we took in a family of eight orange cats - a mother with her seven 1 week old kittens. They were found next to a Dumpster, the mother. Peaches was nursing the kittens there. I guess she was next to the Dumpster so she could get food.  They are pictured in the two photos above.

 A couple of days after taking them in, we took them to the vet to have the mother tested for FIV (Feline Immunodeficiency Virus),  Unfortunately, the mother was positive :(  Although this virus is not a death sentence, it does make them harder to be adopted.  We learned that about 25-30% of all kittens born to positive mothers will be positive themselves.  We ran in depth blood tests on all 7 kittens and all were negative for FIV except the last 2 we tested.  They turned up positive.  I did a lot of research and found out about a very new treatment -T-cyte that I ended up needing to call the company to get information about.  This is a treatment to help both FIV and FeLV positive cats.  It's success rate is very high - 75-80%.  The best thing about this medicine is, if it doesn't help them, it won't hurt them!  They have also had a great deal of success with kittens who are born with the virus.  If they are treated very early with 4 shots, they are likely to become negative :)!

The photo below is of Buffy aka Poundcake.  He WAS positive.

The next photo is of Sabrina AKA Pumpkincake.  She WAS the other kitten who received a positive result.
The following photo is of me saying goodbye to the sweet mother who is thankfully in a good home with a relative who has no other cats.  She is being treated with T-cyte as well.  Her blood tests have improved dramatically and her vet says she is very healthy!

When I called T-cyte for information, a vet answered the phone right away and explained everything to me.  He even agreed to talk to my vet about the treatments because my vet was not familiar with this new medicine. They were great to work with and communicate with!

The photo below is of Pound cake and pumpkin cake in their new home.  I flew them to Kansas City at the beginning of July to be with a very nice family who wanted to adopt them even though they knew they were F I V positive...Once in their new home they were treated with 4 doses each of T-cyte.

It may sound like a miracle, and maybe it is, but the kittens were retested at 6 months of age after being treated and tested NEGATIVE - YaY!!!

Poundcake <3

Pumpkincake

I love happy endings!  I can't imagine this story being any happier.  Thanks to my friend Heidi and her family for adopting these two sweet babies and to T-cyte for creating such a miracle drug!   They are both very happy and healthy 8 month old kitties now who have an excellent family and forever home.  PLEASE spread the word because it's not well known.  Also, feel free to ask me any questions or leave a comment.

Thanks so much for stopping by and spreading the word!  I will leave you with a photo of Poundcake with Izzy, one of her lovely new family members <3

The top photo is of "Oliver".  I have been bottle feeding him for the last seven days.  He only weighed 12 ounces when we got him last Sunday and today he weighed in at whopping

1 pound and 2 ounces! 

I posted the KMR can because I thought it was "uncanny" how much Oliver looks like the kitten model!

Bottle feeding very young kittens is tricky business.  Oliver was about 2 weeks old when he came to us.  Most kittens begin to eat on their own between 4 and 6 weeks,some start a little sooner and some take a little longer. 

Here is a great article that I have found very helpful for feeding newborn kittens: 

http://www.2ndchance.info/orphankitten.htm

Little Peanut became lactose intolerant.  He was vomiting and we brought him to the emergency vet since he was so small.  It was also discovered that his urinary tract was too narrow.  He is living with the shelter's vet.  He is six weeks old now and doing well.  He's eating on his own and the urinary tract issue seems to be resolving :)  I worry about him, but know that his living with the vet is the BEST place for him!

The above photo is of "Little Peanut".  I will keep you posted on both babies.  Thanks so much for stopping by and take care my friends.

Michelle

 He already likes to play.  Just like all of our other cats.  He likes the stuffed bananna toy best

He loves to be held!
We've set up a large crate with a litter box, toys, and a little bit of kitten formula which he will hopefully start drinking on his own soon :)

He is drinking KMR (Kitten Milk Replacement) for newborn kittens from birth to 6 weeks.  It is best to feed newborn kittens with a bottle as opposed to a syringe so they are less likely to get milk in their lungs.  Of course mother's milk is best, but he was found all alone.  However, he seems stong and weighs 14 ounces!

We are calling him Little Peanut because he looks so similar to our four year old male cat named Peanut when he was a baby:
Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you all have a wonderful Monday.  Take care my friends!

Michelle