Almost Caught My Breath...

I was just beginning to get over the passing of my sweet Petunia, when my other little darling Rosie left me. She had been losing a 2 month long battle with cancer. The tumors had gotten so large, that the poor girl couldn't properly walk or groom. To eat, she had to sit in the bowl so the sides would lift up the tumors enough that she could use her front paws to grab and hold the food to eat. I tried to hand feed her, but she was little miss independent and wouldn't eat out of my hand... She was extremely active to the very end, even though she struggled just to walk, the tumors itched so badly that she dug holes in her skin, and her fur was falling out where the tumors were...

In this picture, you can clearly see the tumors. They doubled in size over the two weeks after this picture was taken. I was not able to get another picture before she passed...

This is my favorite picture of her...

Good-bye darling Rosy...

I'll miss your curiousness and the peek-a-boo games we played.

Nosy Rosy - R.I.P - 11/17/06

Another Sad, Sad Day...

My special girl Petunia passed away last night. In tribute to her I have created a special slideshow, just of her photos...


Create Your Own!

Good-bye my angel! Mommy loves you....

Pretty Petunia - R. I. P. - 11/02/06

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun!

Create Your Own!

Slideshow!

Create Your Own!

Kisses All Around!

Now I have Violet trained to come back to me whenever I want. I simply tap my forefinger into the opposite outstretched palm and make a ntch, ntch, ntch sound and she will come right to my palm! She also gives kisses! If I put her on my arm and hold it up above my shoulder and say "Where are my kisses?" She will walk over to my face and touch it with her nose! She is sooo cool! I hope that the other girls will decide to copy Miss Violet. I've been working on Rosy and she is almost giving me kisses, but will NOT come when called. In fact, she will head in exactly the opposite direction - little stinker!

Another amazing thing happened. I picked up Petunia yesterday and she had a small feather suck to her eye. Where it came from, I'll never know, but I gently removed it from her eye and now she wants to love on me all of the time! She never runs away when I go to pick her up and she will sit in my hand and snuggle. Of course, she loves to go running on her wheel. I found another small wheel for my desk so I can have one girl out at a time and spend time with each of them in turn while still working on my computer. Petunia has gotten so friendly that she actually will climb onto the back of my hand and ride it while I'm using the mouse! I wish I could get pictures of this stuff, but I can't balance the camera, mouse and Petunia. She also loves to crawl into my printer and I constantly have to chase her out so she doesn't get stuck or squished.

All of the girls love to crawl around on my desk. In fact, I got the cutest picture of Violet exploring the tape dispenser. Here are some pics of the girls on my desk:

You can see Rosy's tail here-

She loves to hide behind my hole punch! It is really hard to get her back out!This is Violet examining my tape dispenser.And Lastly, Petunia is here listening to a CD.

I Wanna Hold Your Hand

It's so exciting! I actually have Violet and Rosy trained to walk out of the cage and into my hand! I never thought that I could get them to do it! Unfortunately, Petunia and Hazel are not so willing and I usually have to get them to run into a toilet paper tube and pick it up quickly before they run back out. Then they will reluctantly come out into my hand.

I gave the girls a treat log that had nuts, seeds and grains all held together by honey. They loved it! They wouldn't leave it alone and ate on it until it was completely gone. It took them 3 days to finish it off, but they did it. Of course, then they had really runny poo and were pretty sick to their stomachs for a couple of days. Live and Learn! No more treat sticks like that. The only treats they get from now on is fresh fruits and veggies and the chew biscuits from Kaytee. I really like those because it helps wear down their teeth while they are getting a treat. Also, the green ones turn their little poos green! You can always tell who ate the green one!

Bath Time!

I gave the girls their first bath today. They didn’t want to get into the water at first, but then decided that they kind of liked it and swam around a little in the small square plastic container I had filled with water. I dried them all off with a towel and Rosy really liked being rubbed in the towel. Rosy has begun a little game with me. I cup my hands together and make two open holes by touching my thumbs to my forefingers. Rosy will go into my hands then will peek her head out through one hole, then through the other hole and then she out of the middle. Then sits and looks at me for a few minutes. When I smile at her and say, “How’s my good girl?” the game starts all over again –peek, peek, sit; peek, peek, sit. She seems to really like this game and will play for more than an hour every time. Violet hates to be inside of a towel. She would rather sit on my shoulder and lick herself dry. Petunia likes to be dried off, but it must be very gentle. Hazel doesn’t want to have anything to do with me. She is so skitterish, so I usually leave her alone.

Our Evening Routine...

Each night I say "Good Night" to each one of the girls. Rosy has decided that she likes my hair and we play a little game each night where I stick my hair through the bars of the cage and she grooms me. This usually takes about 10 minutes before she gets bored. I wish I could have gotten a picture, but there was no way to get both of us in the picture correctly. Then I put my finger against the bars and Petunia will smell it and Violet will try to bite it. Finally, the girls will go up into the removable petting zone to snuggle down and I run my finger across the top of the lid and Petunia and Violet will put their noses against the lid where my finger is touching. Lastly, it's lights out...and within a half an hour, you can hear the girls on their nightly mission to play and eat and drink and groom and chase each other...

Our Morning Routine...

Each morning when I get up, the girls get up and greet me by standing on their hind legs and grabbing the cage wires with their front legs and sticking their noses between the bars. They each take their turn, with either Rosy or Violet coming around first. I say "Good Morning" to each girl and spend a little time rubbing their noses through the bars. Then I sit down at the table next to their cage and eat my breakfast while they go get their nuggets and eat, too. After we eat together, the girls get a drink and groom themselves so they can go back to sleep full and clean. I say "Good-Bye"when I leave and the girls snugle back down for a nap. It's really interesting that the girls are trained to get up at the time I get up in the morning. Even when I don't get up at that time, the girls are up and waiting for me. :) When I don't get up on time, the girls make lots of noise. If I come out, they stop. If I don't come out, they keep on making the noise for about 30 minutes. After that, I think they finally give up or get tired out, but they are definintely used to my daily routine!

Home, Sweet, Home

After doing so much research on cages, I thought that I would post a pic of the cage I decided on. I have been very happy with it as it has lots of fun things for the girls to climb and lots of different ways to add on to it. Though sometimes it is a little bit of a pain to clean, only because there are so many pieces and I have 4 little mousies living in one cage. Overall, though, I am quite pleased with it and so are the girls!

As you can see, I added a second wheel, since the girls are always fighting to get on the one that came with the cage. I added one of the silent wheels. Boy, do I love it! It truly is silent! And not only that, it is super easy to clean! The girls love it too, because it turns very easily. It's fun to watch them stop running but see the wheel still rock side to side. I think that Violet and Rosy really love that feeling because both of them will run for about a minute, then stop and sit until the rocking stops, then they will run again! It is amazing the games mice will play and the ways they will entertain themselves. I never thought that mice could have so much personality!

Settling In Nicely!

The girls are settling in nicely and are very happy with their new home. I also bought hamster balls for them and let them run around the apartment at the same time – each in their own little ball. It is sooooo adorable! I wish I could get a good picture or some video, but I have been unsuccessful so far. If I can get some, I will definitely post it in this blog! I have some pics of the girls, but have been having a hard time uploading all of the pics. I am still working on that – hopefully I can get them all up soon. It has been easier to get Rosy and Violet out of the cage, but Petunia and especially Hazel are almost impossible to get out! In fact, I made a mistake the other day. I was trying to get the girls out so I could clean their cage and Petunia and Hazel stuffed themselves partway up a tube, so I thought that if I poked Petunia in the butt, that they would both move and I could grab one of them. What I didn’t know was that Petunia had flipped around and when I stuck my finger in the tube, she bit me! Luckily it didn’t break the skin, but it sure surprised me! Well, that’s what I get for trying to force them... I definitely won’t be doing that again!!

Here we are!

I finally managed to figure out how to post multiple photos!

So here are pics of the girls!

Sad day...

When I got up and said good morning to the girls, I noticed that Daisy was acting strangely. She was running around and eating different pieces of poop. I tried to get her to stop, but she was undeterred. I figured it was just the stress from the long ride home and the new environment.

So, I went to work. After work, I went to Pet Smart to pick up the Crittertrail 3 cage I had decided on (after 4 hours of reasearch on cages and mouse homes). They were the only ones that actually had one in stock for a decent price ($45.00). I also picked up some Branch Bites and some Bed Fluff. I am so going to spoil these girls!

When I got home, I said hello to the girls, but couldn't find Daisy. After much searching, I saw a small light colored paw sticking out from underneath the mouse pile on the bottom of the cage. I shooed the other girls away, and sure enough, there was Daisy lying on her back - dead. I thought that I had done something wrong and immediately called the shelter. Linda, the owner of the shelter assured me that I had probably not done anything wrong and asked me if she had any lumps on her body. I replied that she had 2, one on her stomach and one under her front right arm. That's when I found out that mice can often die of mammary cancer.

I went out and purchased a very nice box and had a short funeral for her. I was really sad, because I thought she was going to be the most fun of all the mice! Also, she was the only tan in the group. Afterwards, I put together the Crittertrail 3 and added bedding, food, water and a branch bite. It was really hard to get the other girls out of the old cage and into the new one. Rosy seemed to be a little less shy, but Violet and Hazel were nearly impossible to catch!

Well, everybody is finally settled in and it's time to do more research on foods and toys. I imagine I'll be going to bed late again tonight!

Crazy Daisy - 05-24-06 R.I.P.

The Drive Home...

Well, I made it out to the shelter without too much trouble. When I saw those little cuties, I knew I had to take them all - all 5 of them! The only problem was that I didn't have any way to transport them. Luckily, the shelter had an extra cage they sold me for $10.

I really liked the set up of the cage - it was a Penn-Plax Cyberspace Module cage. It was tall, but not too wide and had a really quiet wheel. Unfortunately, I didn't have any bedding for the girls and by the time we arrived at my friend's home (which I pass on the way to my own home) they were pretty stinky!

Even though my friends all thought I was a little cuckoo for adopting mice, once they saw them, they completely understood why I had to adopt them. Fortunately, I have an extremely creative friend, Lisa, who helped me decide on names for the girls: Pretty Petunia, Crazy Daisy, Nosy Rosy, Shrinking Violet and Hesitant Hazel.

By now, it was definitely time to make a short stop at the pet store for some bedding and munchies! I picked up some Care-Fresh bedding and Kaytee Forti-Diet mouse and rat food and took the girls home. I cleaned up the cage a little, got the girls some fresh water and put some food in the cage. The girls seemed nervous, but happy and Crazy Daisy couldn't wait to get out of the cage and crawl all over me! She is such a card! I can't believe how friendly she is for the first day!

Well, I'm going to let the girls settle in and I'm going to bed. Can't wait to see what happens tomorrow! I definitely have to get a bigger cage!

Introductions, please...

I have always been fascinated by mice, though never wanted to touch one. That is until I decided to adopt 5 of them from a shelter. This is the story of my mice and me...