And so time came for weaning of The Cat and Sprocket’s kittens who had been living on the terrace.

After breakfast in the garden, Sprocket went back to the terrace while The Cat remained in the garden. Starting with the biggest kitten (Oranjiboom), Sprocket picked them up one by one and carried them down to the garden. This was obviously hard work – through the stone balustrade, a jump down onto the cross-wall, a walk along to reach the olive tree, then a slip and a slither down the sloping branches to reach to the fork near the bottom from where Sprocket (with a kitten firmly clamped in her mouth) jumped down onto the green plastic crates, stepping down into the garden. Each kitten was deposited next to a fig sapling, where The Cat sat. Every time she returned for a kitten, Sprocket separated out the next kitten in her list and fed them so they would be calm when she returned to collect them. The last kitten to be carried down was her son, Little Bang.

With all seven kittens in the garden, The Cat led them in a group to the feeding bowls where they took their first mouthfuls of wet food with their mothers close by.

It didn’t take long for the kittens to discover the pods and they all piled in to one together at bedtime and slept in a pile. There was room for one of the mothers to join them, wash and feed them, and they were warm and cosy.

The Cat and Sprocket were happy with the new arrangement, and the kittens had started the next phase of their lives.