The two litters were quite the adventure. We had two queens and they delivered at the same time. Everything was fine until each had their first two. Both queens got worried when they heard the other's kittens and we had to separate them meaning I had to have my husband help with which ever queen I wasn't helping. One queen had a kitten with a bulge on the stomach so we had to rush her to the vet with the kitten. We were hoping it was just an umbilical hernia, which it is. It can be hopefully fix when it is time to spay or neutered at 3 pounds or 12 weeks old, possibly 2 pounds something to fix it sooner. This queen had 4 kittens all together. 

The second queen had two kittens, then delayed her labor when she got worried about the other queens kittens. We brought her to the vet and they said no problem, happens all the time. I was skeptical but gave it time. At 10PM we called an after hours vet, they again said not to worry, happens all the time as long as she's not pushing for 2 hours. I was still skeptical. I stayed up the second night in a row with her and fell asleep at around 4am. My husband checked on her in the morning at 6AM on way to work and she was fine. I slept through my alarm at 6:30 to take her in when the vet opens at 7AM and woke up at 8:30 with a cleaned up new dead kitten. We took her to the vet, no if and or buts we wanted an x-ray and the kittens out. It was her last kitten and so there were no stuck ones. 

One of the hassles of breeding purebreds is finding a vet who knows how to handle breeding. With responsible pet owners spaying and neutering their pets, and only irresponsible people breading mixed kittens and who don 't want to spend money on vets, vets are left with little hand on training and usually snotty attitude for breeders that we are betraying cats worldwide by taking up potential cat homes. And I usually feel I know more than the vet as they either are "dog vets" (I’ve had this said to me) or seen only a few stray cat litters. I miss Cats Exclusive in Shoreline and sometimes ponder the over 1 hour drive from Renton to go there. This was the one place I knew the vets knew more than me and were CAT vets.

So to get back to the kittens, we have 6 kittens all together, 4 slivers and 2 white with one of the white with the hernia. We decided to have the queen with 4 kittens adopt the 2 kitten litter so the moms no longer have to fight over the kittens. They kept going to each other’s nest and trying to take the kittens or jumping in with the other queen and no room for the kittens to nurse. The mom with the two kittens also doesn't get empty nest syndrome (and if anything is happy to kick them to the curb at 12 weeks old batting them away when they try to nurse) when her kittens go so she's adapting well to letting her kittens go. The adopting mom LOVES kittens and cries horribly when separated from them and adopts any baby who comes up to her unconditionally. We actually have to use a spray bottle at 4 months to wean the kittens cause she'll never deny them.

So it was a very long two day delivery in which I got 6 hours of sleep over 3 days. It was gloomy and sad like the rain today and tired with so little sleep throughout our vigil, but when I came home from a 3 hour work shift and settled down for first kitten pictures the gloom of a lost kitten started to be replaced by the joy of such a gorgeous litter with so many silver kittens, rare for us as there are two white genes which dominate over all other colors.