It’s no secret that cats are creatures of habit, and that they like their routines. Not surprisingly, cats’ routines will develop around their humans’ schedule and household routines. While such a routine driven life may seem boring to humans, it helps cats feel safe and confident. In fact, routines are so important to cats that having them disrupted can even impact their physical health.
I was going to tell you about Allegra and Ruby’s morning routine, but they wanted to tell you in their own words.
Allegra: I’m usually up first. I get up between 3 and 4am, and patrol the house to make sure everything is in order. I’m very quiet when I do this, because I don’t want to wake Mom and Ruby. Once I’ve made sure that it’s safe for Mom and Ruby to get up, I go back to bed for a little while longer.
Ruby: I like to sleep curled up against Mom, and I’m not going to budge until she starts moving around, which is usually around 4:30am. Once she does that, I know it won’t be long until she gets up and feeds us breakfast, so I stretch and start to wash myself.
Allegra: Once I know Mom is starting to wake up, I help the process along by walking up and down the side of the bed. Sometimes, I even nip at her hand or foot if they’re sticking out from under the covers.
Ruby: Allegra, you know Mom doesn’t like it when you do that!
Allegra: Oh, like you should talk! You’ve been known to bounce up and down on Mom when she takes her time waking up!
Ruby: blows raspberry at Allegra.
Allegra: Once Mom sits up on the side of the bed, I get really excited. I start racing out of the bedroom and wait for her in the hallway.
Ruby: I escort Mom to the bathroom. It’s where I eat my breakfast, so I make sure she gets there okay and doesn’t get lost along the way.
Allegra: Once Mom closes the door on Ruby in the bathroom, I lead the way into the kitchen, and I watch closely while she gets our breakfast ready. Sometimes, that seems to take forever, so I nip at her toes to speed things along. It never seems to work, if anything, it slows things down because she stops what she’s doing and tells me “Allegra, don’t.” But I just can’t help myself. Once I smell our food, I get so excited. Thankfully, Mom puts my dish down first before she takes Ruby’s food into the bathroom.
Ruby: I can hear Mom getting things ready in the kitchen, and when she comes into the bathroom with my breakfast, I’m so happy! Yummies!
Allegra: After I finish my breakfast, Mom puts my dish away. I sit in front of the bathroom door and wait for Ruby to finish.
Ruby: Mom always praises me when I finish my breakfast. She calls me a “finicky eater” sometimes. I don’t know what that means, but some days, I just don’t want my entire meal. On those days, she still says “good girl, Ruby” but she doesn’t sound as happy as she does on “clean plate club” days.
Allegra: Once Ruby comes out of the bathroom, I try to chase her and play with her, but most mornings, she’d rather look out the window.
Ruby: Allegra, it’s not healthy to run around right after eating!
Allegra: Once Mom has fed us, she gets her coffee and sits in front of the computer. At that point, we know that she’s lost to us for the next couple of hours, so we usually take a little nap.
Ruby: I like my after breakfast nap, but I also can’t wait for Mom to take her first break of the day in the morning – because it means she’ll play with us!
Allegra: She gets the fun toys out of the hall closet, and we both get to play until we’re tired!
Ruby: And then we get treats!
Allegra: Sometimes, I keep Mom company while she has her breakfast (and maybe taste test her yogurt or smoothies, just to make sure it’s okay for her to eat,) but most mornings, I’m ready for a nice long nap at that point.
Ruby: I wait for Mom to finish her breakfast, and then I follow her to her office, where I settle in for a nice long nap on the window perch next to her desk. I know she works better with me close by.
And now we’d like to hear about your kitties’ morning routine – share it in a comment.
So precious! I loved reading this! I find my cats’ routines a very calming start to the day. Reading this reminds me of how much I miss the routines of pets that have passed, and how much I will miss the routines of my current pets when they are no longer with me. Thank you, Ingrid, for reminding me to cherish these memories now.
Ha ha ha. Meeka here! My routine is pretty fun. First, I wake up at around 2 in the morning and patrol. Once satisfied, I tear around the house, screaming my head off. Its a great way to get rid of mice. Sometimes Mom wakes up. Once everyone in the house is up, I follow them around, asking for breakfast. Normally, one human feeds me, who is Ender. They love me. After I eat, I try to get seconds, but I usually am caught in the act. AFter that, its time to cuddle with Ender and get my beautiful 90% white calico hair all over their clothes, ESPECIALLY if they are black.
After that, I run around again, screaming and then take a nap.
After a long night of restful sleep on the bed next to Mum and Dad I wake up very hungry, usually around 4:30am. I will climb up on to the bed side table and start to claw at Mum’s books, she loves her books nearly as much as she loves me and Luna the kitten so I know that this action wakes her up instantly. If she decides to snooze after telling me off I will proceed to the desk and claw at the art books. This will definitely wake Mum up and she will feed Luna(who has woken up to see what the fuss is about) and me. Then after having a yummy breakfast, Luna and I will chase each other around the house until Mum and Dad wake up for work. Luna likes to sit on Dad’s shoulders as he has his morning coffee and I will sneak back to bed to get some more restful sleep in a bed all to myself.
Felix.
The morning dawns cold and grey; Dad rouses himself briefly to turn off the alarm, rolling back to bed. I am alertly sitting on the doona cover. After enough time passes by my internal clock, I pace up and down the bed by Dad’s snoozing silhouette. I pause at his head. I put a paw to his face or neck. He opens his eyes. I ululate my morning’s greetings and conditions. He closes his eyes. If I really want to intrude into his drowsiness, I put a paw to the back of his head with a touch of claw. If I want him to feel happy and his hands are arranged perfectly, I use my head to flick his hands on to my head for a pat. Eventually Dad rises, shambles to the bathroom, shaves and brushes his teeth, showers and gets ready for work. If he is early enough, he meditates. To my satisfaction and delight, he feeds me a few minutes before he gathers his things, leaves the radio on for me, and heads out the door. I have enjoyed our morning routine throughout, meowing at him to remind him to feed me. Now that the apartment is quiet, apart from the comforting chatter of the radio, I hop up to my cat tree and look out the glass doors to see the birds and the dentist next door setting up for the day. Time for the first of many naps.
Finn
Thank you for sharing all of your morning routines! Allegra and Ruby were busy taking notes….
Hello, I’m Skittles, I’m the oldest and CEO of the team, there are six of us all rescues and the big guy who serves us. Well the big guy gets up for work at 4:40 A.M. Usually Sanibel and Sabre sleep in the bedroom with him, Sierra always goes right in to check on him and get some attention, me Captiva and Lone Wolf wait until he comes out of the bedroom, he then makes his rounds checking on us and looking for any “presents” otherwise known as hairballs, while he shaves, we play or run about the house, he then cleans the litter boxes, and fills the multiple water fountains, then it’s breakfast, he feeds Sabre in one bedroom, she’s a vacuum with her food, he feeds Sanibel in his bedroom she eats very slowly, and the rest of us get fed in the kitchen, as we eat he finishes getting ready for work, then washes the dishes, opens up the drapes and blinds to the windows, gets his lunch, hot tea, and work stuff out to the truck, comes back in for final one on one attention for all of us, then off to work he goes while we take our first of many naps.
You girls are so cute! We get up at 8 during the week (later on weekends) and Mudpie is never in a rush for breakfast. She’d rather look out the windows to see what she missed overnight. Brunch is more her style!
We kitties don’t really have a routine because it depends on our humans morning schedule. Some days she’s up early and feeds us after her shower other days it’s later in the morning (those are the days she doesn’t need to go to work) and other days we may not get feed until their human has come back home after taking care of other cats and dogs, those are the days we don’t like because sometimes we don’t eat in forever!!!! We can’t even go in and let her know we want food because she does something called ‘fostering’ and has a foster cat in the bedroom with her that she is trying to socialize and teach that humans are okay and that she doesn’t need to hide under the bed all the time :).
My Sadie eats in the porch with complete solitude from Emma, who loves to get Sadie’s food! so, this is the only way Sadie eats, you know she’s Tortishell cat, so the Torties, do not want to be bothered by any other animal around..
Mom feeds me separately from the kids. what a great idea so I am able to eat relaxed in the kitchen while they are upstairs in the playroom.
I love the special treatment – today is my 16th birthday. So send me special thoughts. Thanks and pawpats!
Cute Ingrid!
Just wondering why Ruby has to eat in the bathroom? Guessing she is the chow hound and will maybe gobble Allegra’s food if they both eat together in the kitchen?
My Molly is that way (but she has EPI). Still though, both cats can eat in the kitchen, Molly usually on the window ledge or butcher block table and Mikey on the kitchen table. To prevent Molly from eating Mikey’s food, I serve Molly in portions, slowly: when she’s finished with one small serving, I give her another, before she jumps on the table where Mikey is eating. It takes little longer to feed them this way but works out well.
And I’m guessing there aren’t any litter boxes in your bathroom…. Lol….you know far better than most people not to mix those two together…. 🙂
When I still fed both of them in the kitchen, Ruby would inevitably try to eat Allegra’s food instead of her own, and it became exhausting directing her back to her own dish so Allegra could eat in peace. It works much better this way!
And no litter box in the bathroom 🙂
I have never had a cat but heard plenty of stories like this over the years. It wasn’t until I had to look after a neighbour’s cat for a few weeks that I realised it was all true!
Wow! You two are really easy on Mom. I am not so patient. I like to get up at 3am. That’s when Dad used to get up and take his pills and I would get a treat. Now Mom gets up at 3am gives me a treat and goes back to bed until 4:30. Then I get fed and when the sun comes up I get to go outside for an hour and come back and take a nap. Depending on when Mom works (she works retail so her schedule is never the same), I spend the day inside napping and chasing the sun rays or playing with my toys.
When Mom has a special event week (like a couple of weeks ago), my routine always gets messed up. I still get her up early and we get play time. Then she is off and running. One day she worked over 17 hours and didn’t get home till 2am. When she came home, she got in the shower and I pulled the shower curtain down to remind her who is really in charge. She laughed and we got to snuggle for the few hours she was home.
Luckily both of us are creatures of habit. I love our days off together especially when Mom stays home and does all those things that humans have to do and kitties don’t. That’s when I get extra attention and love. Once in a while she does nothing at all and we get to do whatever we want. She calls them Piper Kitty Days. We get to play, and snuggle and Mom sometimes stays in her pajamas and just relaxes. Those are my favorite days. I think Mom needs a day like that really soon. She’s been working extra hard and seems tired. I need to remind her of that.
P.S. I love it when you two take over the post! It’s so much fun to read, but don’t tell your Mom. I wouldn’t want her to get upset. 😉
Have a great day! It’s time for my morning nap!
Piper Began
My name is Gremlin – I’m the alpha male in my household. We have 13 other kitties that live here with me and almost always my mom Suellen takes care of those annoying babies that she is always feeding with a bottle and holding. Anyway, it is rather hectic here – we wake Mom up at 4:30 by pacing back and forth in front of her bedroom door. Sometimes we get to sleep with her but her bed is not big enough for all of us. One of my housemates, Busy Bus, starts throwing things out of the dish drainer in the kitchen and boy, you would not believe how fast that gets mom’s attention! She gets our breakfast first thing, even before her coffee then she has to go into our litter room and clean. There are a couple of housemates that are not as neat as I am….Julie for one – she can’t walk so she sometimes misses the cat tray – but mom doesn’t mind. Then we all pile onto her bed while she has her coffee and reads the latest from The Conscious Cat. She reads that every day – I can’t imagine why – she has 14 of her own!!!!
Awww, I love that reading our site is part of your morning routine, Suellen!
Sounds like you ladies have such a good life and have that Mom well trained. We all like to get up early too. You all have a great day.
Sounds like a good routine. My kitties get fed around 5:30AM and then a couple look out the window and the rest go back and take a nap till my son wakes up.
Miss Kiki always wakes up about 4 or so and likes to give me a hand and face wash before I get out of bed. She says she wants to be sure I am presentable for when daddy wakes up.
I love being woken up by a kitty tongue!
Allegro & Ruby, Thank you for sharing your morning routine. It was fun to read.
Ruby & Allerga,
Grayson & Milo’s routine is simple. Mom says she has one of those inside clocks. She knows when to get up without a clock. Clock…… what’s a clock??? Well anyway… Mom shakes our food rug out puts back down, & gives us fresh water, & crunchies. Mom says we boys are messy eaters. What is a mess??!!!!
That’s it for us, Milo & Grayson.
I sleep at the foot of the bed, but often sit on mom if it gets cold or I get lonely. The old man usually moves into the other room in the early morning because he snores like a damned chainsaw. About 6am, I camp out at the door of the other room and nail the old guy when he gets up about 7am. He usually greets me, pets me, and feeds me. After he has breakfast, and I go out in the backyard to do all those things I’m too shy to discuss, I come back in, and the old guy or mom plays gets out my favorite toys and plays with me. Then it’s time for a long nap, either in the house somewhere or outside under my favorite bush. They both say I’m neither an indoor nor an outdoor cat, I’m a door cat. I make my servants work that door! Little Button
Rajah: I usually wake up when Mom starts to move around. Mostly around nine to ten in the morning. Sometimes, I’m awake before her. In that case, I’ll jump on the bed and head butt her arm or shoulder and meow. After she wakes up, I ask for breakfast. I usually give her a hug to sweeten the deal. After she feeds me, I enjoy it! When I’m done eating, I wash myself and go see what she’s doing. I rub up against her leg to let her know I’m there. She usually talks to me and scratches me between the shoulders and I purr in contentment. Then I listen to the music she puts on while she writes, then I take a nap. When I wake up, Mom and I play! My favorite toy is a duck on something Mom calls a wand. I love making Mom laugh and smile by jumping in the air and meowing as I try to catch the duck!
Wow, you kitties get up early! I usually sleep in until about 9 AM, when my human wakes up, and so do Binga and Boodie. About the time your human gets up on the east coast is when my human is going to bed on the West Coast (1:30 AM – three hours behind you, time zone wise!).