Saturday evening, Aaron mowed the backyard, which hadn’t been mowed for, oh, weeks. The grass isn’t growing, and there was no sense breaking out the mower just to cut the weeds. Anyway, as he was mowing, he noticed a feral cat hanging around the backyard. At one point he called me to the door and said, “That cat isn’t leaving the yard! She acts like it’s her yard!”

He walked towards her, but she ran from him, yet refused to leave. We just shrugged it off, thinking she was some weird cat who happened to like our yard.

And then today, I walked out into the backyard, looking inside the play barn and noticing Aaron forgot to move it and mow there. And then a bit of fur catches my eye.

Suddenly I know why the cat refused to leave the yard. And it’s a good thing Aaron didn’t move the play barn.

It makes sense – our yard is completely fenced, making it a good hideout from predators. And the play barn is a nice shelter from hawks. Guess she thought we were a good hideout for her family. I have to respect her as a mom – she picked a good spot.

Now what in the world are we going to do about these five kittens? The mother in me has already determined that they will not be moved or taken from their mom, especially this young. Their eyes aren’t even open yet. (But they’re already doing that adorable kitten hiss when I peek in the window. So cute!) She took too much care in finding a good spot for them for me to rip them away from her.

So I guess for now I’m going to buy some cheap cat food so she doesn’t have to spend all her time hunting for food. Maybe we can tame her down enough that we can move the whole family to a nice farm somewhere? There’s no way we’re keeping any of them – we have too many living things to take care of as it is.