Pictures of Cats - Kiki Taking a Nap

by Matt
(Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, USA)

For your pictures of cats page here's Kiki - she was a stray who adopted us the summer after Hurricane Katrina. She started hanging around on our back fence even though our dogs kept barking at her.

We weren't looking to adopt a cat, but she kept coming around, so we started feeding her. The local animal shelters were receiving a large number of cats on a daily basis, so we couldn't take her to any of them. It would have been a death sentence, and Kiki was too sweet. We reported her to one of the local animal rescue groups so they could help find her a home.

While we waited, Kiki slowly worked her way into out home. She made friends with my 1-year-old niece. She started waiting outside the back door and running into the house whenever it opened. At first we put her back outside, but one night we had severe thunderstorms so we let her stay inside.

By now she was coming around every day, so we bought a food dish and a litterbox and took her to the vet. There was no exact point at which she became our cat. She just took over little by little, and now she stays inside most of the time.