Tiny kitten is found frozen to a piece of plastic in the snowy woods, but a family's unexpected detour saves her life just in time: 'It was meant to be'

Author image for Mariel Ruvinsky
Mariel Ruvinsky • Writer and Editor
Oct 29, 2026 11:00 AM EDT

The CDS always delivers its packages, in the heat and in the cold. 

Now that the cold weather is finally here, now that you have to wear seven layers when you get out of the house, it's time to start paying attention. To cats. Obviously, we know that our audience is full of people who always keep an ear out for cats who need help. But now, you have to start doing it more than ever. Because while we can pull out those seven layers out of our closet and brave the cold world, cats do not have the same option. They have what they have, and when the cold hits, they don't have air conditioners to come home too. 

Every cold season, we start coming across the same stories - people rescuing freezing cats. We cover an endless number of these stories, because we think that they are so important. Every time we write about a story like this, of someone rescuing a cat, we think about all of the cats who we're not writing about, all the cats who were not saved from the cold. We hate thinking about it, but we think that we, the writers of ICHC, with the platform that we have, need to remind people of this. Listen. Listen for the meows. And don't ignore them. If the kitten in this story wasn't saved when it was, then it would not have made it. You can save a kitten this winter in the same exact way. If you only listen. 

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    "We found this poor little kitten in the woods, covered in ice, with her fur stuck to the hunk of plastic she was hiding under for shelter. We saved her"

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    Me and my kids were out exploring the fallen snow in the woods. We suddenly heard a cat meowing, over and over, it seemed to be in trouble. We finally found her under a random hunk of plastic laying there, she must have gotten under there for shelter.
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    She was COMPLETELY covered in ice, and her fur was stuck to the side of the plastic thing she was hiding under, so she couldn't move. It was so sad, she's tiny, maybe 3-4 weeks old.
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    We got her free and brought her home. We've been warming her up and feeding her, she's so happy now. Poor thing, if we hadn't just happened to go in that direction, we never would have found her, and she would have suffered and d d there
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    I was adamant we wouldn't go above 3 cats in the house again, but this one just feels like it was meant to be ours
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  • Sometimes, the CDS truly doesn't ask whether you want another cat or not. It spots a cat in need and a warm home, and it sets the two up with one another without asking questions. And this is a kitten who clearly needed a home, especially with no momma cat around to protect it. Likely what happened is that once momma cat realized that her baby was stuck and that there was nothing she could do about it, she took her other kittens and tried to save at least them from the storm. It was lucky that this family was passing by. There is no chance that this kitten would have made it out there without them. 

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    1. WOW, I have never had a post blow up on Reddit before, this is crazy! A lot of people have expressed how nice it was to see something positive, during a rough time. I'm genuinely happy that I was able to bring something positive and uplifting to so many people's lives! This precious kitten definitely did that for us!
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    2. This has been asked a lot. We HAVE returned to the spot we found her to see if we can find the mama cat, or any other kittens. We've been back twice so far, but nothing turned up. We plan to check again tomorrow.
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    3. We plan to take her to a vet to get checked out as soon as the weather permits. For now, we're keeping her isolated from the rest of our cats. 4. Her name is Elsa :)
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  • We have to say that Elsa… is the purrfect name for this kitten. Because she really is the ice queen. The cold did bother her a little bit, but she survived. She made sure to survive. She heard you coming, and she was as loud as she could be, loud enough to get your attention, which is all that she needed to do. She was a fighter. And she deserves the attention that she got online. Both because she is absolutely adorable, and because hearing stories like this - of people doing such a kind thing - might encourage more people to do the same. 

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    "Updates on the sweet ice princess, Elsa!"

    AN A
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    A lot of people requested that I keep you all updated, so I've been trying to post updates the last couple days but keep running into problems. So, here's attempt #4 at updating y'all on sweet baby Elsa! Here's what she's been up to.
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    1. She was so hungry. We tried feeding her some chicken broth, and also some of the juice from a can of wet food, but she wasn't really interested.
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    Then we found out she needs kitten formula, but all of the stores around us were closed due to the storm. I posted my dilemma in some of my church GroupMe groups, and a nice couple from our Sunday School class gave us a bunch of kitten formula and kitten wet food! I had to drive in the storm to get it, but I was extremely careful. She's been loving it :)
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    2. She has slept with our daughter all night, each night we've had her, right up against her, but under the covers (daughter doesn't move around in her sleep). We figure Elsa wants to be EXTRA warm
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    3. We returned to the area where we found her and looked around thoroughly, but didn't see any other cats. I included some pics of the thing she was hiding under for shelter, for those of you who were curious.
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    I also included a picture of her from the walk back to our house yesterday where you can see more of the ice on her, and that was AFTER we removed tons of large chunks.
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    For oral/topical use only
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    4. Our vet was closed Monday, but we were able to get her in yesterday! She is very healthy, just needed some antibiotics, plus Revolution just in case. 5. Our vet confirmed she is right around 4 weeks old, just like we thought :)
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    6. We started trying to wean her onto more solid food this morning, but she wasn't really interested, so we're sticking with the kitten formula just a bit longer and will try again soon. 7. Now that we know she's healthy, we're slowly working on introducing her to our other cats. Stay tuned for some pics of them snuggling together!
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    Carolina
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    st By/09/11/26 0415 B INK erwine 47 CHERRY
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