Kimora, Lulu and Bertrude

Two years ago, Jake surprised me with our dog, Kimora (don’t ask where the name came from… it was the rescue’s doing). You see, we had been fostering her and her sister, Ebony for a week while the foster parents were on vacation. When the end of the week came, Ebony had gotten adopted, but Kimora hadn’t. We gave her back to the foster parents and literally for two days, she was all I thought about. I kept telling Jake that we shouldn’t have let her go and how much I missed her pee-smelling little black-bear-cub-looking self. I felt like a part of me was missing. At the time, we were living at the U in an apartment where we weren’t allowed to have pets (shh don’t tell) which was the reason why we hadn’t kept her. But much to my delight, since Valentine’s Day and my birthday were right around the corner, Jake surprised me by picking her up one day and saying she was ours! He had secretly given her back to the foster parents for a couple of days, knowing full well that we were going to take her right back two days later. That sneaky little devil. He did have to listen to me whine and be pathetic for those two days though… that’s his punishment for making me go through that.

This is our little Kimora when we first got her…

Kimora as a pup… they thought she was a black lab back then… ha!

Kimora has quite the personality. She is FULL of energy. She runs faster, harder and longer than any dog I’ve ever seen. She’ll tire out any dog she plays with. She got a yappy little bark that she thinks scares people (which it kind of does, especially when they don’t know that she’d never hurt a fly). She is obsessed with chasing squirrels, and she knows them by name. She can be completely asleep and at the mention of the word “squirrel”, she leaps up and sprints to the window barking. (In fact, she’s probably going crazy at home right now at the mention of the s-word so many times in this post.)

All of this is great, but none of it is my favorite thing about her. My favorite part about Kimora is that she actually thinks she’s a human. She sleeps with us in the bed, often times between Jake and I under the covers. She knows our tv shows by name and if we sit down to watch them, she watches with us. If we say, “Kimora, we have to go to work,” she walks into her kennel, where she stays all day until we get home. But my favorite thing is the noises she makes. This is a new hobby of hers. She’ll moan if we move her when she’s sleeping, or she’ll make a kind of shrieking noise when she yawns… all of the noises she hears us make, she seems to try to imitate. It’s the cutest thing.

One year ago, Jake and I decided that we wanted to get a cat. We decided it would be our Valentine’s Day gift to each other (do you sense a theme here?). So we got Lulu a week before Valentine’s Day. When we first got her, she was too young to know if she was a girl or a boy. We lived in St. Louis Park so we decided that we would do a take off of Louis so we could always remember where we lived when we got her. So we decided Louie would be its name if it was a boy and Lulu would be it if it were a girl. And Lulu it is. Now, Lulu isn’t your typical cat, mostly because she grew up around Kimora. She loves wrestling with Kimora; in fact, most of the time, she’s the one egging Kimora on. Her fur patterns are very interesting. She’s got a striped tail, like a raccoon, and what I call cow splotches on her back. She was also a hair stylist in a previous life; any time someone has wet hair, she will find it and she will groom it until it is perfect.

But my favorite thing about Lulu is her standard of comfort. Lulu, no matter where in the house it is, will find the spare piece of paper or cardboard or fabric. If there is a 2 inch by 2 inch piece of paper laying on the floor, that’s where you will find her laying. I don’t know why that is, but she must think it’s softer or more comfortable or something. And she is completely obsessed with boxes and plant pots. She loves laying in them, playing in then and taunting Kimora from them. I’ve figured out a secret. Lulu doesn’t normally like to lay with us… she’s a friendly cat, but not really the cuddling type. So if I ever want to spend time with her. I just get a shoebox and sit it next to me. Within minutes, she’s always laying right there in it.

Lulu in her box

So, this year marks Jake and I’s third Valentine’s Day together and I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want. I’ve decided that this year, I won’t ask for much. This year, I want a hippopotamus for Valentine’s Day. I’m thinking maybe I’ll call her Bertrude, Bertie for short… ?

The girls anxiously awaiting their new sister Bertrude.

Bertie… photo credit to kabbachi