The Beginning

It all started with a picture. When I saw this first picture of her, I instantly fell in love and set about getting her. Then I was shown other photos of her as she got older.
(In the second photo, she's the one on the left.)

I saw her unusual coloring and mask on her face, and was sure I'd made the right choice.
When it was finally time for her to come home with me, I was ecstatic.
Me and Savvy went to Mass. and got to the breeder's house. When she placed the adorable animal in my hands I was so happy I almost didn't notice the prickles. Almost.

She is quite prickly. When her spines are up, or extended, she feels kinda like toothpicks. When they're more flat on her body, her top feels like a hairbrush. She's getting used to me holding her, as am I, and she can get quite active her our hands.

On the 2 and 1/2 hour drive home, she was in her basket I brought and she began doing this thing called, anointing. It's rather cool/amusing. She finds a smell she's surrounded with, and then gets the taste of it in her mouth by licking it. She then works up this foam in her mouth and uses her long tongue to coat herself in it. Okay, it sounds gross, but it's amusing how flexible they are; almost cat-like.

Another thing she does when she's freaked is "popping". This is where she extends her spines and jerks upward, like a twitch. It's designed to startle and cause pain to whatever is "attacking" it. And it serves this purpose quite well. She's only just beginning to not pop at me all the time when I try to pick her up.

I have her in a cage with a wheel and an igloo for her to hide in. She likes her wheel a lot and ran in it all night. They like to hide in toilet paper tubes, so I snatched a big one from work and put it in there. She's also been munching on the food I have for her. It's adorable when she crunches, because the spines on the top of her face move down with each bite.

I've been taking her out, and holding her, so has my mom. It's important to socialize them, get them used to being handled, so they'll be nice. Not a problem. I love holding her. She's very cute and fun to hold. She's sweet, still timid, but we'll be working on it.