Breakthrough?

While Jasper and I were in Utah last week, Codi and Arcadia spent a ton of time downstairs with J. This was notable because after we adopted Jasper in July, neither of the cats has hung out with us downstairs much. Codi comes down occasionally to play with Jasper, but Arcadia never shows her face unless it's late at night and she wants to urge us towards bed (where she gets to be the center of attention). With the dog gone, though, both cats re-established the main floor as their territory.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when Arcadia kept coming downstairs after Jasper and I returned home. It was like having a whole new cat. Something clicked in her brain, and she finally seemed to realize that A: Jasper's not that scary and B: she can totally mess with his mind and bend him to her will. Even though it's a little evil (right now her favorite hobby is standing on the coffee table and swatting at his head) we're encouraging it because we know how much happier she'll be if she just gets over her fear of being anywhere near the dog.

Well, this afternoon we seem to have made another breakthrough. I was outside doing some yardwork, and when I came back in, I saw this:



Not only was Arcadia in the same room as Jasper, but she was trying to socialize with him! Success!

I imagine that we'll take a few more steps forward and back with these two over the next few weeks, but I really do think that we've turned a corner here.