Introducing our new kittens, Beo & Jiji

Atlanta, GA • June 17, 2024

Introducing the Kittens to eachother

We picked up Jiji a month and a half before Beowulf and she quickly because the Queen of the castle. I don’t know why I thought introducing them would be easy becuase they are both babies. I was wrong, but it wasn’t awful. Jiji, being a baby herself was already quite territorial. She hissed at Beo a lot and I felt scared that he was not going to feel very welcome. I worried that he would be scared but he bravely kept approaching Jiji trying to play and eventually she gave in. Within a few hours they were all love and suggles.

Miss Jiji

Miss Jiji was meant to be ours in so many ways. My daughter wanted a black male cat for years and always knew she would name the kitten Jiji. If you’re a fan of Studio Ghibli movies, you know “Jiji” is the black cat from the movie *Kiki’s Delivery Service*. Fun fact: “Kiki” is my nickname in my family since I was a kid, so having a cat named Jiji feels just right. Anyway, on our hunt for a black kitten, we found a little black male named Jack at a local foster/rescue. However, when we inquired about him, someone had already adopted him.

Lucky for us, the lady who was fostering him mentioned she had more kittens. Jack’s sister, Jill, was up for adoption as well. It was fitting because we could keep her original name and Jiji as her nickname. We went to pick her up the next day, and I also noticed she was born on 1/26. This also happened to be the same day we had to put our dog down the year before. The universe sent her to us right when we needed her and she needed us.

This sweet girl took to us right away. Unlike many kittens/cats, she is super friendly to anyone she comes in contact with, and she LOVES to be held. Every time someone comes in the house, she runs right down the steps and is ready for snuggles and love. She really is such a sweet angel. Jiji also has a very unique color. I may be wrong and maybe it’s common, but I’ve never seen a black-on-black striped cat. Apparently, this is “black tabby,” but to me, it’s super cool and unique, and you can only see her black stripes in the light.

Beowulf Oberon

Beowulf, a.k.a. Beo for short, came to us in a completely different way. Yes, I purchased him from a breeder for quite a high price. Don’t come after me, keyboard warriors. The last time I checked, I can do what I want with my own money, and I still fully support adoption. Obviously, we adopted our sweet Jiji. I wanted Jiji to have a friend since kittens do much better with a companion to play with. I knew I wanted a black Maine Coon because I have always loved the breed, but as I learned, solid blacks are actually a bit more rare. Black Maine Coon kittens are more commonly black smoke, which is a dark smokey gray.

While looking around, I found one of the local breeders in the Atlanta area recently had a litter born on 2/26/24, just one month apart from Jiji. There were 3 black males. She said two of them looked to be black smoke, and the third, which was our Beo, looked like he might turn into black smoke or might remain solid black like the father, which was what I was looking for. She sent me some pics and videos, and I fell in love with him immediately, not caring what color he ended up.

breeder/rescue information

Beowulf is a legally registered purebred Maine Coon kitten with a pedigree. When giving your kitten a registered name, they follow the order of the mother’s litter. Since this was her second litter, all the babies were to be registered with “B” names. I originally picked Beezle, after the devil of solitude in my favorite childhood movie, *The Adventures of Unico*. That also happens to be the name of a demon in the Bible, so we decided against it. A name holds a lot of power when naming your pets. Next, I immediately thought of Beowulf, the hero in the Old English poem of the same name. His middle name, Oberon, comes from the fairy king in Shakespeare’s *A Midsummer Night’s Dream*. The perfect, majestic name for a majestic little cat!

Beo is also such a joy. He was the most playful in his litter and is a mischievous little soul. While he’s not a huge fan of being held, he’s getting much more comfortable with it. Now he loves to come up for snuggles and chin rubs, on his own terms, of course! Size-wise, he has also quickly surpassed Miss Jiji and is almost double her size now. Maine Coons can reach up to 30 lbs, so I’m anxious to see how big my sweet boy gets!

Sent from my iPhone

I look forward to watching both of little ones grow and thrive and I know they will be a permanent part of our family for the rest of their lives! Also just an FYI if you are in the Atlanta Area and looking to adopt a kitten or puppy check out this rescue which is where we got Jiji: