All hail Princess Aurora!

Yeah…I know this was only supposed to happen in December.

 When you’re not even 4 yet, it’s a loooong wait till December! I thought I might break up the wait into more manageable pieces if we popped into the pet shop every few weeks to prepare what the princess would need to make her cage a home. You know, like this week we’d get the wood shavings, two weeks later the food, two weeks later a little house thingy, two weeks later a ball and then ta-dah, miss hamster herself.

Well, that WAS the plan, but once Nicola laid eyes on the little critters she gave me the quivering-bottom-lip and the shiny-with-with-tears eyes, “But mommy, she says she wants to come home with us today?”.  You would have had a heart of stone to resist that pleading face.

The princess is settling in nicely. It took her about an hour to get comfortable in Chez Aurora, but by this morning she was zipping around those tunnels and on the training wheel like she’d been there forever! Nicola is completely besotted with her, and I have to admit – she’s so darn cute.

My brother used to have a hamster when we were kids, but I don’t remember that one being as vocal as this one. Aurora squeaks at us if we do something she doesn’t like, also some strange clicking noises and so on, but so far no nips – she doesn’t look aggressive at all, just a bit skittish, but I’m sure we’ll get past that soon. And yes, I’m pretty sure she’s a female, I asked them to check at the pet shop, which is when I heard her squeak the first time in protest – just after that she made a very impressive leap out of the lady’s hands and luckily landed in a box full of soft things almost a meter away (note to self: definitely keep her in a container with a lid when cleaning the cage).

My usually pretty camera shy daughter was so taken with her first pet that she said, “Mommy, take a photo of me and Aurora!” and posed for me.

Ps! On an un-hamster related cryptic note: I love it when someone who’s been pissing me off for two straight months has a chink in their armour…and I happen upon it. 😀

PPS! Major Christmas shopping done this week, only two family gifts to go and one birthday gift for my brother – yay me! I may have this done and dusted before we even crack December, unheard of! 😀

Car ride home.

Nicola and Aurora.

Close up. She a russian miniature hamster, and so far we know she likes apple and cashew nuts, but isn’t really impressed with the bag of hamster food I bought for her.