For their birthdays the last two years my girls have collected donations for our local humane society. They love going in to drop off the donations and getting their picture taken with the pets.
They have been asking and asking and asking for a kitten, but my husband is concerned about how our senior dog would react to a kitten in his home. He's also more of a dog person than a cat person though he loves all animals.
Throughout the school year our oldest daughter, Mia, would bring home books about kittens and cats every week from the library. She read books on different types of cats, how to care for them and how to play with them. She insisted on reading them to Daddy.
Over the weekend we were at my parents' house and while we were working out in the yard I overheard my three little girls talking up on the deck about what they are going to name their new kitten (which we have not yet agreed to). Names were flying and my oldest suggested Donut and that was it. The conversation continued, would Donut be a boy or a girl kitten? Where would they put Donut's food and water dishes? What about Donut's litter box? There was no question about who would clean said litter box because Mia announced that she has experience with that from taking care of the neighbor's cat. Where would Donut sleep? When all of these questions were answered then they were talking about all the ways they would play with the kitten and how they would introduce the kitten to our dog, Mookie.
Not realizing that we heard their conversation Mia asked when is the humane society going to open again because it's kitten season and “we wanna go look at the kittens.”
I think our dog would be fine with a kitten. He really isn't bothered by much. The kids want a kitten so bad and Mia has put in the work doing her research. How are we supposed to deny them?
I'm also a little worried about not having a pet in the house when Mookie leaves us. He is 15 years old and his joints are giving him problems. He's pretty healthy besides that, but he's old and we know that day is coming. My daughter, Zoey, has taken it very hard when friends and other family members have had to put down their pets I can't imagine how she is going to react when we have to make that decision for Mookie. If we had another pet at home I think it might be a little easier for her to cope. Am I wrong? No other pet is going to fill the void of losing a pet, but would it help ease the pain?
