Summer's Here!

We've had about two months of constant rain here in England, and not just unrelenting drizzle, but the kind of monsoon rain that makes you think you're in Mumbai or somewhere! We've been either stuck inside in the dry, or when we do venture out, we're likely to get caught in a downpour and just have to hope we can find somewhere we can sit and wait it out without getting too drenched.

But this weekend the sun came out and we remembered how fun it is to play outside! And Rachel remembered how fun it is to take lots of photos of us - she cleared about 30GB of photos and videos of us off the laptop in June so I think she's been a bit scared of filling it up again too fast...

But how can she resist Mia posing in front of the heuchera?

Unfortunately with all the rain the garden has got a bit overgrown...

The grass has been too wet to cut as well so there's plenty to play with... and munch!

My favourite place to hang out is under the washing line, the grass is always long there even when it does get cut, so it's a good place to hide and wait to ambush your portly tortie friend...

Hm where is she... This sun is lovely and warm... Always ready to ambush though... always alert... always ready to... yawn... pounce... al...ways...

zzz...

Garden Invader AGAIN!

Ok... grovel grovel... we haven't blogged for a whole MONTH!! Sorry!! We've got to let Rachel off the hook though - she had her viva exam for her PhD, so was working hard on that and didn't have time to study, AND sort lovely cats out with their collars, AND type up our blog posts too. Good news though - she passed her exam so now is pretty much a Dr! Hurrah!

What's that, Rachel? You're not a Dr of medicine? You can't save anyone's life? What's the point of that!! Hmm, Mrs PRETEND DOCTOR, well I suppose you ARE still qualified to type up our musings for us... (mutter mutter... Gillian McKeith... mutter mutter...)

So, last time but one we blogged, we mentioned the naughty black-and-white garden invader, AKA Bella, AKA cheeky monkey. And if you remember, we were worried that while we were away at the cat spa for a couple of weeks, she'd take over our garden... well, we were kind of right. Just take a look at this video from the week we were back! NO RESPECT!

Gosh, the youth of today! All that talking back she does!

And the worst of it is that we're off to the cat spa again today, and so god knows what'll have happened when we get back...

Hunting

I caught a mouse!! It was so exciting!!

I was out in the garden and I saw it twitching and sniffing by a treetrunk and I stalked it silent as the night for ages for hours and hours as it scurried about looking for worms or something yucky and then I stepped on an old crunchy leaf and the mouse stopped and turned around and looked at me - right at me - right at me with it's beady little eye - and I growled at it and it looked scared as well it should I am terrifying and it shook like a leaf and ran away but then I found it again later on by the purple geraniums under the buddleia tree and this time I crept closer and closer and my paws were so quiet on the soil this time not even a rustle I avoided the leaves I was like a ballet dancer and eventually I was so close I could smell its stinky sweaty mouse smell and it was deep in concentration looking at something it was stock still not moving at all and I was just a whisker from its nasty tail and then I struck I pounced I leapt through the air so gracefully like a gazelle and BAM I landed on it and HUZZAH my paws closed around it - victory at last - and I put it between my sharp razor teeth still struggling and I ran down the garden like the wind dodging the washing line and the wheelbarrow whose wheel doesn't turn and the puddles of water from the sprinkler and the empty pots blown out of the shed by the wind and then I reached the patio where Lila was sitting by the barbecue and all I could see as I flew by was her wide eyes of surprise that yes I - silly little clumsy Mia - had been the first after more than a year to catch something other than a fly in the garden and then I was almost at the back door and I could see someone's feet and legs in the dining room and it was Rachel in her slippers I screeched to a halt as she turned to look down at me and I proudly laid my quarry at her feet brown and furry and dirty looking with its paws in the air and its body frozen in fear and its long long tail stretched out on the carpet I knew she would be so proud of me and tell me how I was her big scary tiger and so pleased to receive what a wonderful present from her clever clever Mia.

She did tell me how clever I was and what a wonderful present... BUT then...

She laughed at me! And she giggled at my savaged mouse! And she called Pete and he came downstairs and positively guffawed!

How RUDE!!!

Snake, It's A Snake!

It's still really nice and sunny here, in fact it's been SO sunny it hasn't rained for ages. It's been so dry that Rachel has had to water the plants. She says that's just silly as it's April, it should be raining all the time.  We don't like it when she waters the garden as all the lovely dry sandy soil that we like to roll around in gets all muddy, ick.

Anyway it reminded me of when we first arrived here at Rachel and Pete's house last year, and we didn't know WHAT was going on with some of the funny things they did. The garden hose gave me quite a shock when I first saw it...



Rachel tried to video me with the hose again this spring, but it didn't work - I'm way more savvy and cool now! Hope you all have a great Easter!

Sunny Days Of Spring

Thought we had better get this post out before the sunny weather disappears!  We had a lovely girls-only weekend as Pete was away hitting a very small ball with a stick. It was so lovely and warm - actually we found the heat a bit of a shock and stayed inside, lounging on the cool tiles in the bathroom.

Rachel seemed to like it though, she put her shorts on and showed us her white legs (heehee) and then spent a lot of time putting more dirt into pots (we still don't understand this).  We meowed plaintively from the back door to try and make her come back inside so that Lila could sit on her and I could have my tummy tickled, but it didn't work, she was having too much fun out there.  So in the afternoon when it had cooled down a little and there was a bit more shade, we ventured out.

I found a great place to sit, amongst the wallflowers and daffodils. I discovered that if you find a big enough clump of daffodils, you can kind of lean your head gently on the stems without them breaking.  We found out the hard way that you aren't meant to break flower stems, we did that the other week when racing down the garden and got a bit of a telling off.  Whoops.  Anyway from this vantage point I was nicely shaded, but the soil was warm and dry, and best bit - I could jump out at Rachel and Lila as they walked down the path.  Yay!

Lila found a nice sunny patch and rolled around in it.  She got her bumblebee collar absolutely filthy!

Then she checked out the little baby plants in this funny box thing.  Hang on, these were just pots of dirt last week?!  Aha, perhaps I am getting closer to understanding the whole dirt-in-pots thing now...

The box thing isn't looking quite as smart now; since on Sunday morning before Rachel got up, Lila jumped off the fence onto it and broke it!!  Rachel was really cross and said some sweary words while she was fixing it.  Heehee.  Lila thought she'd got away with it but the dusty pawprints showed one of us was the culprit, and I'm too scared to go up on the fence, so Rachel knew it was her!

She Wandered Lonely As A Cloud

There she was, stretching her legs in the garden - enjoying the first sunny day she'd seen in a while.  The spring bulbs were just beginning to show their colours (despite concerted efforts to dig them all up immediately after planting last November).  She stopped to delicately sniff their fresh scent, and allowed herself a moment to reminisce on the warm spring days of the previous year, when she and her clever, beautiful mother had first arrived in this paradise, and their heady days of first exploration.

She heard a rustle, and glanced up to the end of the garden, where the soft, new buds on the magnolia tree gently moved in the breeze. Oh how perfect this day is, how peaceful, she thought; as she contemplated the cool, damp soil under her paws.

But in her reverie she had not seen the black terror lurking in the woods, closely watching her every movement.  She could not have seen it; even if she had known it was there - for it sat silently as a shadow, and perfectly camouflaged (well, except for the bright yellow collar).

The terror perched on the fence apparently still; yet every muscle was poised; every sinew taut, waiting, waiting for the perfect moment to strike, to unleash speed, power, stealth, and not forgetting great terror, upon the unsuspecting silly baby cat posing for the camera...

GOTCHAAAAAAA!!!