Taylor Cat's Big Adventure

Being a stay at home mom to a two-month-old, my days tend to be pretty uneventful for the most part. We typically don't venture out a whole lot unless it's to take a quick trip to the store or a walk around the neighborhood so every day looks pretty much the same: nurse Emma, play with Emma, nap time for Emma while I write, exercise or clean the house, repeat, repeat, repeat. Monday was different, though. Monday was eventful and I'm here to tell you why.

I woke up Monday morning to the most gorgeous weather. It was about 70 degrees outside and I could hear our wind chime out back chiming away in the breeze. I immediately decided we had to squeeze in a walk because it was too gorgeous outside not to.

Emma was pretty fussy most of the morning so I almost decided to put our walk off until the afternoon, but I knew it would probably warm up by then so around 11, I put Emma in the stroller, leashed Abby up, packed some dog treats in a cup and off we went.

We walked along and as we walked, we walked through lots of small branches and piles of moss that had been blown into the sidewalk during the storm. Each time, Abby had to check it out or step over it so we were moving slow which didn't bother me at all since it was so nice out and Emma was calm as could be in the stroller.

We were a few streets over from our house when Abby seemed to see something under the stroller and stuck her head under it to check it out. I assumed it was more debris from the storm, so I tugged on her leash and kept pushing the stroller when I saw a cat walk from under the stroller into the woods next to us. It took me a second to realize it wasn't just a cat. It was our cat. Taylor Cat!

"Oh my God! Taylor!" I yelled. I stepped forward to grab her and before I knew it, she was walking off into the woods and I swear I caught her look back at me and laugh.

You're probably wondering how Taylor ended up there. See, we keep the stroller in the house since we've been using it so much lately and I didn't realize she had been sleeping in the little basket under the stroller when I decided to take the girls for a walk.

I immediately grabbed the cup of dog treats I had and called her name trying to get her to come back to me on her own. I didn't want to run at her because I knew she'd get scared and run further into the woods. Of course, having Abby on the leash wasn't helping because she wasn't about to willingly come up to Abby who is constantly bothering her at home.

Despite the fact that she's constantly trying to escape from our house, she is not an outdoor cat so thankfully, she didn't know what to do once was out in the wild so she just kind of moved from one spot in the woods to another instead of running off completely.

Within a few seconds, I was in tears not knowing how I was going to get her back. I couldn't go into the woods leaving Abby and the stroller unattended and Taylor wasn't coming back no matter how many treats I dropped for her. Thankfully, an older gentlemen was taking a walk and came up to help. He held Abby's leash while I ran in to try and grab Taylor. I quickly realized this wasn't going to work because she kept creeping farther away from me and Emma had started crying in the stroller by then.

I called Jonathan hysterically crying and thankfully, he was only about 10 minutes away and able to come help. The older gentleman stuck around to keep an eye on Taylor so we knew where to send Jonathan when he got there and I stood there trying to calm Emma down and held onto Abby while we waited. Our fear was that Taylor would get spooked and run off deep into the woods or into the street. At least with her right there, she was too scared to go any farther and we still knew she was okay.

Jonathan showed up about 20 minutes later and thankfully he was able to track her down within a few minutes. She, of course, walked right up to him when he called her name and he drove her back to the house while I walked back with the girls.

It was quite the ordeal. The second she ran away from me into the woods, my fear was that I'd be calling Jonathan telling him she was lost so I'm so incredibly thankful that man happened to be walking by and was so willing to help while we waited for Jonathan to arrive. If it wasn't for him, I don't think I would've been able to at least keep an eye on where Taylor was hiding while taking care of Emma and Abby at the same time.

Abby is constantly chasing her around the house trying to play so Taylor hides in that little stroller basket all the time to stay out of Abby's path but I never would have thought to check there before we left the house. I will be from now on, of course!

Taylor's Hiding Spot

I still can't believe she was just sitting in there as walked down the street. She's been trying to escape our house for years so she probably couldn't believe it either! I'm just glad she didn't run out into the middle of the road or something. At least the way it happened, she walked right into the woods and there were too many obstacles for her to just run away.

Once we were home and had both animals back in the house, Jonathan headed back to work, I put Emma down for a nap. I had some things I wanted to do but instead, I grabbed a beer and sat down for a minute to recover and chill out for a minute.

I mentioned yesterday how our family day at the park on Sunday was Abby's Big Day Out. I told Jonathan that Taylor must've been jealous she wasn't included in our adventure that day and decided she'd have one of her own!

So to recap, most days are pretty uneventful. Monday was not one of those days.

The End