All we needed was a little Mojo

The first picture of Mojo

Cat friends

Most that have been following me know how much we all love cats here, and that we used to have them in the past, but in Budapest weren't allowed to have them. Looking back, probably a good thing because otherwise the emigration would have become much more complicated for us. Ever since we arrived in Spain, we found street cats everywhere. During our first week, we discovered a nest with two lovely ones (one tiger pattern) that we would have loved to adopt. They were at a (closed) school and neighbors took care of them by feeding them and making sure they have water. This is something I've been seeing constantly here, the people take good care of the animals on the streets, and I really respect that. I plan on doing the same!

The nest at school was removed

Just a few weeks ago, the nest at the school got removed probably because there was a cleaning lady that called in some rescue organization is my guess. Too bad, we went to visit them often and now knew we lost them as our new possible furry friends. Downhill, we found another nest and some bigger cats, unfortunately these were not curious and 100% feral. Every time we past this part, we went to look if we could make contact but even the lady that feeds them daily, could not get them to get curious or closer. We knew this litter was not optional for us. We stopped looking for them online as well, and just hoped that the cat for us would come to our path at the right time. Meanwhile, every cat we passed of course received some extra attention, lol.

Kitten memories

Although I had a cat before I got together with my boyfriend, the true kitten memories only came from the time I was close to moving in with him as his cat, simply called Cat :) haha escaped and got knocked up by some neighborhood cat. I remember that I could not wait to visit him after the kittens were born and even before that, how special it was for the cat to lie next to me and feeling the kittens move in her belly. Everything went well and our first experience with tiny kittens that looked like the cutest monsters at first was a fact. In total we had 3 nests from our 2 cats, which was such a great time and filled with constant love and playfulness. Although not looking to have unsterilized cats and litters anymore, we were in true need for some cat-love in our home.

Unexpected find

We have noticed that contact with animals is doing our daughter good and for that reason alone, I hoped we could find a cat family member soon. But as always, things come to your path when you least expect it, it was not any different with this situation. My boyfriend and daughter went for an evening walk 2 days ago and walked in the direction of her (hopefully) new school. Instead of going right, then turned left and it's crazy to say but this is actually the area located directly behind our swimming pool area, which is closed for another few years btw, so these kittens were so close all this time!

Several nests

Not one but at least two nests are here. One contains 6 kittens with tiger print and the other at least of 1 black kitten and 1 black with white kitten. Funny thing to mention is since our cool kitten phase, we adore these tiger-looking kittens to the point that we really hoped our next friend would be one of those. We were open for other ones too, but secretly I hoped to cross paths with one of these as they are so very playful, we adored watching the tiger sibling of the last nest we had at home.

Making friends and building trust

When the kittens were found, boyfriend and daughter spent time to sit there and check if they are curious. When they noticed they were, they walked back home (2 mins tops) to get some treats to hopefully make them interested to come closer. This worked! My daughter started making meowing sounds and guess what? All cats came out from behind the gate! All of them! She's the cat whisperer haha. My boyfriend recorded it and I'm glad he did, that was so cool to watch as I was not there with them.

The youngest vs the one that comes to you

Boyfriend made it very clear for some years, only kittens allowed. We aren't going for a cat that's older, it will be harder to correct him or her, and I kind of get where he's coming from as we rent including furniture. It's not a big deal replacing curtains from IKEA (cheap ones) but I'd be less happy having to replace the big couch honestly. So some things to take into consideration for sure. But what is another kitten that's still kitten but slightly bigger (probably the previous nest so older sibling) is the one that makes contact with all three of us? What do you do then? Are you still aiming to rescue a small one or accepting the fact that this one is more curious to who these people are and therefore probably easier to catch?

The next day

We knew one of these cute little ones would be our new forever friend, so we needed to be prepared. I was given the task to find a carrier, litter box, food, toys, bowls and make sure the little one could be welcomed home in case we'd catch him or her sooner than expected. Personally, I thought we might need a week or so to gain their trust, but decided not to waste time on online order and go for what was offered downhill in the market stores.

Ready to welcome our new family member home

Thankfully, the carrier was perfect and gave me faith, the catching part would be doable. Once all supplies were carried uphill, and the rest delivered by the kind store owner, it was time to have another visit together with my daughter.

I felt for the black and white one

This one you see in the front, was the first one to come to us. But it was clear this one was not as strong as the others and it seemed as if this one was blind. My daughter was meowing and as you can see, the others came to check who was there too.

At some point I saw this black and white one tried to find the food, but could not see it and also had a hard time finding it with his or her nose, my heart broke a bit, to be honest. And then I decided I'd try to see if giving it from my hand was optional, and he or she allowed it. We actually managed to give some snacks but I decided to stop in time to make sure the little one wouldn't be overfed suddenly. I really had the idea there was no sight. That is until he or she decided to come through the gate and run off diving under every car, it didn't seem like it was the first rodeo on the street so that made me a bit less scared it would get hit by a car. People that saw the kitten all slowed down as well, thankfully.

This little one below was the one from the smallest kittens we had our eyes on, but I already knew from the first moment our Mojo made contact with all three of us, that she picked us and we'd probably catch her first. I'm saying her as I think she's a girl, but haven't checked it properly yet, lol.

This seems to be her little sister as they look alike. Our guess is that ours is from the previous nest and the older sis of the currently smallest kittens. The mother is present, but the kittens aren't drinking from her anymore.

Go time

Just before the sunset, we went back packed with the carrier, a towel (in case it was going to be a tiny kitten and we'd need protection to catch it), we took the bowls, wet and dry food and snacks with us. We also took a toy but that one turned out useless, haha. I think 1 hour passed where we were only able to grab the black cats (I think the fathers lol) attention who started to eat from our dry and wet food gratefully. The neighbors feed them, but the kittens have trouble getting to the water and food (see images above) so our bowls were received well. Slowly momma cat and her kittens appeared and started to notice there was something new on the menu tonight!

It took a while before Mojo appeared

Besides the tiny kittens and the mother, there was also Mojo, I think she's a few months older than the last kittens, and one a bit bigger even, with a very cool pattern, a bit Bengal-ish. So beautiful, but that one was too old so we thought, therefore we hoped to be able to catch either a tiny kitten or Mojo, who of course wasn't named yet at that time because who-ever it was going to be, was going to get named Mojo. Mojo and the other bigger one were very thirsty and probably drinking for 15 minutes straight. As soon as they were done drinking, they noticed the others eating happily from the new bowls as well as some snacks around them. We weren't very surprised Mojo was again very curious and started to eat. Neighbors with dogs were all smiling when they noticed we tried to wait patiently for one to get into the carrier when we hid snacks in there..

Good luck wishes from the neighbor helped!

When the last person passing us smiled and said "Mucha Suerte", I thanked him and it took just minutes after before Mojo entered the carrier and my boyfriend slowly moved towards the carrier and closed it very slowly with his hand. I couldn't believe we actually managed to do this just 24 hours after meeting these kittens. Thankfully, the walk home was just a few minutes and of course Mojo was a bit wild but she didn't make a sound. We placed her on the ground in the living room and made sure it was all safe for her when she'd ran out. This all happened yesterday, meanwhile, we have made good progress and we are 100% in love with this tiny beauty!

To be continued..