Leo Top Ten

When Leo had been here for exactly a week, I sent an email to Chrystal with a top ten kind of list. Yes, I’m that goofy, but hey, it’s all true! Let me share most of that email with you:
　

It is so hard to believe it’s been a whole week since Leo arrived. Then again, it’s hard to believe it’s ONLY been a week! He’s just the sweetest thing and I’m totally enamored with him!

Since it has been a week, let me share with you 10 things I now know about Leo:

1. He’s a love bug! Such a cuddler! He wants to be near me, and not just near, he HAS to be touching me. If he’s between my feet on the footstool, his head is on my ankle. If he’s next to me on the couch or computer chair, he’s leaning his head on me. If I’m holding him, better yet, he curls up in my arms and stays there until I swear my arms will fall off!

2. He calls me! He always wants to know where I am and will call when he doesn’t see me. I call back and he comes trotting over, and depending on his mood, will either go back to playing or exploring or he will demand pets and cuddles.

3. He’s a carrier! There is nothing so cute as seeing him carry around toys! He carries mice, fuzzy balls, and the end of the kitty teaser! The teaser is a long piece of fleece on a stick, and once in a while he’ll pick up the end in his mouth and carry it to the other side of the room! Makes it look like I’m fishing for kitties! And he does it several times a play session!

4. He will let me play with his toes! I love those extra toes, and the fur between his toes is irresistible!

5. The claw on his extra toes is shaped oddly, kind of crooked and wavy.

6. He is not intimidated by growls, hisses, or even being chased! I think he even encourages it sometimes! Star can be hissing almost in his face and he just keeps going like he doesn’t see it or hear it. His attitude is actually starting to wear her down! She’s getting tired of growling when it produces no results.

7. He loves snack time! But he still has to check out what Star got in her bowl before he finishes his own! Of course, she has complete fits about this breach of protocol, but see number 6! (last night they both took turns going to each others bowls and back again, it was too funny as they had the same thing!)

8. He hides well! He has been upstairs at least half a dozen times now, and we have yet to know where he goes when he’s up there, sometimes for hours! He gets in the tiniest spaces! He squeezes behind a TV cabinet, which cant be more than 3 or 4 inches from the wall, and he even got under it and that’s a space probably 4 inches high!

9. He does not understand TV! The first time I turned it on, he disappeared and didn’t show up again until it was off.. I turned it on once when he was sleeping on my footstool between my feet, volume off, and after a while he yawned, caught sight of it from the corner of his eye and fell off the footstool! He slunk out of the room and did not come back. That was in the first few days, yet still today he looks at the TV oddly like he’s wondering what in the world all that noise and movement is.

10. He might be a little klutzy! If he’s on the footstool while playing, he WILL fall off, it’s only a matter of time. If he’s on the computer chair with me, he will fall off more than once, while sleeping or readjusting because I had the audacity to shift.

I just love him for all those and so much more! He’s my cat for sure, exactly as I hoped he would be. He tolerates Greg, he puts up with the nieces (especially the one that lives with us), he acknowledges the nephew and his fiance, but me, he LOVES. He has claimed me and I couldn’t be happier!

Greg asked today, "Now that he’s been here a week, is he everything you wanted?" You bet he is! For all the reasons I’ve said, and a million more, he’s all I hoped for. There’s only one thing that I didn’t expect, and that’s his size! Such a big boy, and still growing! But I don’t even care about that, he’s MY big boy. Star can happily prefer Greg, and I’m glad for the two of them, but I don’t feel left out any more because of my precious Leo the Chinese Lion!

Thank you, Chrystal, so much for one of the best thing anyone’s ever given me!


Tomorrow it will be three weeks since I got my sweet Chinese Lion. Has he changed in that short of time? A little yes, and a little no.

He is still a huge cuddler! And I’m still thrilled about it! I joked to Chrystal in the first email I sent her when we arrived home with Leo that there had been a terrible mistake. I was supposed to get Leo the Chinese Lion, but she’d given me Leo the Chinese Parrot instead! All because he rode half of the 8 hour trip on my shoulder. He is still a shoulder sitter! When I’m at the computer, he thinks that’s time just for him and he crawls up me until I let him on my shoulder. If I try to get him to lay next to me, he leaves, though he did sleep there for hours in the first couple days. He’s back in minutes though, crawling back up to my shoulder and I have to just let him.

I think it was my mother who called him a Leo scarf! And that’s exactly what it feels like! He lays over my shoulder, chin hanging down my back and purrs and purrs and just wants to sleep there. And it’s always my mouse arm! I can’t get him to switch so I can at least do something, no, he wants what he wants and that’s it! If I’m talking to someone on line, I type "Leo scarf"’ and that means ‘sorry, cant type for a while, huggin’ my baby!’

Leo Scarf

He still calls me in the morning and I call back. He still carries toys around. And still has the most adorable toes in the world! He still doesn’t care if Star hisses herself dry, he never says a word back to her, just doesn’t care. I think he’s telling her in his own way, "You can be top cat, just shut up ok?"

Star on left, in her usual spot. Leo tries to get close to her sometimes.

A week or so later, he's closer still.

She didn't know he was there and just after taking this pic,

he stretched out a paw and touched her butt. Boy did she freak!

He loves his nightly snack and yup, still has to check out what Star had. We know that he goes upstairs but have not actually seen him there more than once. However, he tends to smell like cedar, so we’re sure that he’s spending time under the niece’s bed as that’s the only cedar in the house!

That's the end of his tail as he squeezes behind the cabinet.. Silly cat.

He’s not afraid of the TV any more, but he does look at it oddly, still trying to figure out what it is. Klutzy? Yup. And if I can figure out how to get it off her phone, I’ll post a video of him being silly and falling off a chair that my niece took.

Don't like the TV.. turn it off mom...

I love him to pieces, he’s my heart kitty. I didn’t really know if he was going to be this snuggly, and I was prepared for him to favor someone else. I was prepared for him to take forever to adjust to the move and to get used to us. I even tried to prepare myself for the possibility that he would still be too feral and scared to ever love any of us. But all those fears were unfounded. He loves me and I love him! It’s more than I expected and everything I hoped for.

Ah, the kitty teaser!

Having carried it off, he sits with his prize..

until it starts to wiggle again!