The Tree Climbing Exploits of Pearl.

Well, following on from 'Can we keep her, pleeeease?' we have been lucky enough to benefit from another's misfortune.  I'm happy to say that several weeks after her last appearance, we were again visited by the cat the kids had named, Pearl.  We took her to the vet and explained how we had come by her and they checked her to find out if a cat like her had been reported missing or if she had been 'chipped'.  Sadly, she had not and so we took her home and set about printing little paper slips with our contact number on.  These we distributed to all the houses in our road and the street backing onto ours. A week later, we had heard not a peep from any poor person missing their little smokey grey.
Daddy Fox, being an animal lover, agreed that to take her to a shelter would be disagreeable and I promptly called the vet and booked her in for a chipping - and the female 'snip'... and just over a week later and we felt confident that this little being with a bald patch and stitches was rightfully ours.  Large grins from the littluns. Pearl, our pet.  Whoop!
She has settled in very well and like most cats is just plain weird.  Unaffectionate during the day and by night, we can't get rid of her.  She wakes us up several times a night expecting BIG love.  She thinks her place to sleep is smack bang between my head and that of Daddy Fox and there she insists over and over again on trying to settle for the night.  The purring sounds like a Harley Davidson in the still quiet of the night.  At first it was sweet...
This aside, she provides us with many moments and her antics cause us to titter every day.  She chews books and cardboard - is this normal?
So Xmas has passed and the tree is drying out and two nights ago, it started shaking as we watched a film.  We looked at each other and then back to the tree as we realised that the cause of the movement was indeed our smokey grey, midway up the tree and looking towards the fake birds perched towards the top.  As she felt braver, she climbed closer to the top and started to 'kill' any decorations she could get close to.  Not easy given that most are towards the ends of the branches - and the ends of the branches tend to dip when weight is applied. Unperturbed, she went higher where the branches are shorter and approached the robin underneath the angel.
Because of this, we now have only bare branches at the top of the tree and are going to take it down before it has cause to fall down.

And so Christmas was special, in a way as is usual when children are involved, definitely enhanced by our new family member.
Grandad slept in our bed over the period and we occupied the loft.  He's a bit of an insomniac so she either woke him when he had finally dropped off or kept him company while he tried to.  Whichever it was, he didn't complain.

With the tree on it's way out and the cards coming down, this just leaves us to say a big HAPPY NEW YEAR to you all, we hope you have a 2013 filled with love and fun.