People ask how we ended up with four cats. The honest answer is we didn't plan any of them. Each one just happened, and we said yes every time.

Maja and Lili

We were driving home late at night, on a road with nothing around for miles.
My wife spotted something moving on the edge of the road.
Two kittens, maybe four weeks old, sitting there like they'd been placed there.
Clean, healthy, clearly looked after by someone who then decided they didn't want them anymore.

We had no cats. We had no cat food, no litter box, nothing. We took them anyway.

   

Lucky

A few months later we stopped at a highway rest stop to drop off some bulky rubbish.
While I was at the bins I heard something from inside one of them.
In a bag, stuffed in the trash, was a kitten. She'd had cat flu as a baby and it had damaged her eyes.
She can barely see. But she heard me, and I heard her, and that was that. Lucky seemed like the right name.

 

Sunny

This one is harder to tell without it sounding like I'm making it up.

My sister-in-law saw a post on social media. A kitten had been hit by a tractor and was in a barn somewhere, in bad shape.
The vet was considering putting her down. My wife Julia saw one photo of her and that was it.
That same night we got in the car and drove across Germany to get her.

When we arrived she was in a bad way. Hind legs paralysed, ataxia. Wounds everywhere. Worms. S
he had been lying in that barn for a while with nobody properly caring for her.
We brought her home, cleaned her up, and started from scratch.

She needed diapers at first because she couldn't control her bladder on her own.
She hated the diapers with a passion. She made this very clear. So we started working with her, exercises, leg movement, patience.
Slowly, things improved.

She walks now. Wobbly, and only on carpet or anything with grip.
On smooth floors she still drags her back legs.
But she walks.

The diapers have been gone for four months.
She figured out a system: when she needs to go, she comes to find one of us and meows.
If nobody reacts fast enough, the meowing gets significantly louder.
It works. No accidents, no diapers, no drama.
Everyone in this apartment is very proud of her.

 

The four of them together

Maja and Lili are the calm ones. They observe. They cuddle when they feel like it and ignore you when they don't.

Lucky has to inspect everything. New package at the door? Lucky is already on it.
A fly gets into the apartment? Sunny hears it first and makes a sound like a small duck.
Lucky shows up and hunts it down. Despite barely being able to see, she's the best fly hunter we have.

Sunny is sunshine in a small, wobbly body.

When there's food or the hint of a treat, all four appear from wherever they were hiding. That part they all have in common.

That's our little family.