{"id":1865,"date":"2017-03-27T03:49:36","date_gmt":"2017-03-27T11:49:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/?p=1865"},"modified":"2017-03-27T03:49:36","modified_gmt":"2017-03-27T11:49:36","slug":"mindful-monday-whats-in-a-cats-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/?p=1865","title":{"rendered":"Mindful Monday \u2013 What\u2019s in a Cat\u2019s Name?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Lily practicing her alphabet<\/p><\/div>\n

How do you name your cats? Do you keep the name an older cat comes with or do you change it? Do you have a favorite name you\u2019ve saved for the next pet you rescue? Maybe it takes you days to finally discover a name that will fit your new kitten or cat.<\/p>\n

My mother had quite a difficult time naming her cat. This part ragdoll kitten (who looks nothing like a ragdoll) was hand delivered to her from my brother\u2019s family in Idaho and she finally decided to name the grey-and-white kitten Shady. She couldn\u2019t remember the name, however\u2014kept calling him Smokey (which was the name of the cat she\u2019d just lost). So Shady\u2019s name became Smokey by default, you might say.<\/p>\n

When my daughter brought Lily to us, we struggled for about 24-hours to come up with a<\/p>\n

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Lily sneaking a treat<\/p><\/div>\n

name that would suit her. After watching the way this tiny kitten moved, played, interacted with us, approached the other cats, and so forth, I noticed how delicate she was, sweet, soft\u2014she had the softest fur\u2026 I thought she should have a fragile name, and Lily was one of the sweetest daintiest, softest names I could come up with.<\/p>\n

Sophie is a tortie and it didn\u2019t take long for us to give her a name that we thought defined her rather old-fashioned coloring and style.<\/p>\n

Years ago, when we decided to keep a robust little boy kitten\u2014one of 3 we found in our woodpile one summer day\u2014we knew his name should match his demeanor. He was playful, sturdy, confident, funny\u2026I struggled over his name for several days. When I attended a high school graduation, I listened carefully to the names of the graduating students as they were called out and knew as soon as I heard it that this kitten would be known as Max.<\/p>\n

\"\"When a head-strong, long-haired calico came into our life via the Humane Society one summer, she came with the name, Katy. We already had a cat named Katy, so we set out to change this young cat\u2019s name. We threw out a lot of names in her direction and none of them would stick. Finally, we noticed that this cat always joined us when we went into the kitchen, that\u2019s when we realized her name was Dinah. Remember the song\u2026\u201cSomeone\u2019s in the kitchen with Dinah\u2026?\u201d<\/p>\n

But probably the most unusual naming process I\u2019ve been involved in was when my girls were small and we adopted a kitten from the animal shelter. My three daughters and I could not agree on a name. Finally, I suggested we let the kitten name herself. So we wrote our favorite names on pieces of paper and tossed them on the floor, hoping the kitten would grab one of them and that would be her name.<\/p>\n

The kitten, however, didn\u2019t pay any attention to the wads of paper when we tossed them. So we dipped each of them in gravy and tossed them again. This time, she rushed toward the wads, picked one up and ate it. Oops! Now she had a name, but we didn\u2019t know what it was. So the third time we tossed the paper balls, we were quick to grab the one that attracted her and discovered that her name would be PomPom. Yup\u2014the youngest daughter\u2019s choice.<\/p>\n

What are your most unusual cat-naming stories? Do you have trouble naming your pets? Did you know there are several sites listing names for babies as well as pets? I use them, actually, to come up with names for some of my characters in the Klepto Cat Mysteries.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How do you name your cats? Do you keep the name an older cat comes with or do you change it? Do you have a favorite name you\u2019ve saved for the next pet you rescue? Maybe it takes you days … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1865"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1866,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865\/revisions\/1866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}