WELCOME HOME, BENTLEY!

Yes, yes, I've been holding out on you guys - please forgive me! ;o)

My "Las Vegas" and "Hoover Dam" posts and pictures will just have to wait... there's some BIG NEWS here!

It is with much happiness and delight that I would like to introduce you to the newest member of our family, little Bentley Edmund Spencer:

Bentley (aka "Squeak"!) is a 13 week old blue mitted lynx Ragdoll kitten. A southern-born little gentleman, he comes to us all the way from Raleigh, NC.

OK, so here's the whole story!

It has been said that Ragdolls are like potato chips, you can hardly have just one. Well, we have been thinking/talking about getting a new little brother or sister (although I am a total sucker for little boys!) for Boo for quite awhile... and the time finally seemed just right to start looking in earnest. Although health and personality will always be our primary considerations, of course, I had taken quite a fancy to the Ragdoll color/pattern called blue lynx mitted. (Boo is a seal bi-color. For a look at all the various colors/patterns available, please look here... and here!) So, with the decision finally made to add a new kitty to our family, I made it my mission to try to find a blue lynx mitted kitten from a very responsible, very reputable breeder. (A good article on that subject is here.)

My inquiries and research finally led me to Gail Stone of Megailee Ragdolls. From e-mails and phone calls, I liked Gail immediately, and felt very comfortable that she was just who I had been looking for. AND, she had a new litter of 5, and in it were... two little blue lynx mitted boys! AND we had made plans to visit dear friends of ours in North Carolina (of all places!), right about the time the babies would be ready to go (age 12 weeks). It all seemed too good to be true.

Gail provided me with updates and pictures of Bentley through the weeks. (The waiting was TORTURE, by the way; in fact it darn near killed me! haha! ALL that got me through were those updates and pictures from Gail, plus sharing my adventure and excitement with my buddies at Ragdoll Central!)

Here are a few of the pictures Gail sent.

1 week old newborns with their sweet mama (Ragdolls are born all white, and their color[s] develop slowly over a 3-4 year time span; yes, that's YEARS!):

Bentley at age 3.5 weeks old:


At age 5 weeks:

Age 6 weeks:


Age 7 weeks:


Age 9 weeks (and getting cuter by the MINUTE!)


Age 11 weeks:

Here are two photos taken with his adorable "twin brother", the other blue lynx mitted boy. Bentley is the one on the right in each picture:




This is his VERY handsome daddy, Maxwell. (Also a blue lynx mitted; so Bentley should look a lot like this when he is all grown up!)


This is his very beautiful mama, Ceraphina:

Our plans were to swing by Raleigh on our way home from our friends' house, meet Gail, and bring Baby home. It would be a 10-hour drive, and I'm not gonna lie to you, I was a little worried about that! Can you imagine what that would be like with a crying, carsick, upset little kitty? Well, he was neither crying, NOR carsick, NOR upset, and those 10 hours in the car were some of the best 10 hours of my life! He was such a little angel! Really! We started the trip with him in his carrier, but within minutes, he started to cry, this small, pitiful little squeak of a meow, so I took him out and held him. And thus began 10 hours of Heaven! He curled right up in my lap, started to purr, and never moved off my lap for 10 long hours! What a cuddle-bug! He streeeeeetched, he flopped, he looked out the window, he napped, he snugggled some more. It was simply wonderful!

Here's a picture from the car trip, me and my beautiful new baby!


So now we are home and settling in... and this baby is simply amazing. I told Gail it's like he has been sprinkled with pixie dust! He's HILARIOUS, so silly, so playful and SO active (think perpetual motion!), but yet he's also a little lap snuggler and a major purr-box! Boo isn't quite sure WHAT to think, yet, but I have a feeling they will soon be BESTEST BUDDIES!

Here are some pictures of Bentley taken yesterday and today:










And just because they are too cute not to share, here's a few "LOL cat" pictures that my darling niece made from two of Bentley's baby pictures!




And because no post made by me on Ragdolls would be complete without a few recent pictures of Bentley's wonderful big brother, Boo:

And me? I'm the happiest girl on the planet to share my heart and home with these two amazing, wonderful animals!

*happy sigh!*

UPDATE: March 4, 2010

Boo and Bentley are doing GREAT! I couldn't be more pleased!
Here, see for yourself! :o)

TRAVEL, Arizona!

We just got home from an almost-2-week vacation in Arizona and Las Vegas. We had a wonderful time, and it was a very nice break from THE CRAZEEE COLD WEATHER that has been holding PA in its grip! (Although we did get stuck in Cleveland for two nights on the way home because of canceled flights from these crazy northeast blizzards... but that's another post for another time!)

Anyway, we LOVED Arizona -- the colors, the textures, the rugged beauty of the cacti and rocks of the desert against the silhouette of the mountains. Even the scrub grass and tumbleweeds were oddly beautiful.

The SAGUARO cactus was my favorite, and is what most people probably "think of" first when the word "cactus" is mentioned.

Some interesting Saguaro facts:

• Saguaro is an Indian word and the correct pronunciation is "sah-wah-ro."
• The average saguaro has about 5 arms and is about 30 feet tall. The saguaro grows very slowly.
  
• The biggest saguaros are about 200 years old, over 50' tall, and have more than 50 arms.
  
• A saguaro's arms usually only begin to grow only after it is about 15 feet tall and around 75 years old.
  
• The saguaro is found only in the Sonoran Desert, which includes about 120,000 square miles of California and Arizona.
  
• The saguaro flowers every year in May and June, and this is the state flower of Arizona. (It is very apparent to me that I will need to go back sometime in May or June!)
  

Pretty cool, huh?!

Some other Arizona cacti...

Contrary to popular belief, the blue agave is not really a cactus. It is, however, where tequila comes from, which is a pretty cool claim to fame!

I love the architecture in Arizona... and the lovely, neutral colors of the homes that "blend in" so beautifully with their desert and mountain backdrop. The style of homes I was most drawn to is what is sometimes called "territorial", "adobe" or "pueblo" style... gracious, welcoming homes that just "fit" so well in the southwest. And who knew that landscaping done with rocks and cacti could be so beautiful?!

A few beautiful examples:

There was snow in the mountains. Some of the landscape there looked remarkably like PA:

We visited the town of Prescott, and had lunch in a really fun restaurant called "The Palace".

My boy liked the decorations and memorabilia.


An old movie, "Junior Bonner", starring Steve McQueen was filmed there in 1972. I'll have to rent it sometime!


We also visited Jerome, a cool little town with a very colorful history:

Once called the "wickedest town in the West," Jerome was notorious for its gambling, saloons and brothels and was burnt to the ground 3 times between 1897 and 1899. Jerome's population reached 15,000 at one point, but by 1953 when the last [copper, gold and silver] mines closed, its population dwindled to 50 people. For years Jerome was known as Arizona's most populated ghost town. In the 1960's free spirits "discovered" Jerome and the town slowly started to come back to life. Jerome is now an attractive small town featuring a collection of museums, gift shops and art galleries. This unique setting provides for a nice stop... (Info quoted from here.)

There was a really nice coffee shop there, I had a delicious hot mocha ("with double chocolate, please ma'am... and thanks!") *Yum*!

This sign there cracked me up:

It was in Jerome that I saw my first ever "certified" ladies room. Ummm... OK... certified for what? And by whom?! Don'tcha have to wonder?!


We had a delicious lunch one day at Four Peaks Brewery, a really fun place in Tempe. My husband LOVED their Kiltlifter beer, brewed right on site. In fact, he bought a case of it to go. His only wish? That he could take it home on the plane!

We spent a day in Sedona... famous for its dramatic red rock scenery and its "vortex" phenomenon. Hmmm, I'm not sure I experienced any health "benefits" or unusual positive energy ;o) while I was there, but I certainly enjoyed my day!

Driving into Sedona:

Me and my boy at a lookout over the city. A breathtaking view!

And oh, the killer sunsets... a different display of color every evening!






After a few days in Arizona (and not nearly long enough!), we headed off for Las Vegas and a day at Hoover Dam.

... Stay tuned!