How do I know if she's the right weight?

It's been a few days since I asked something random...

I am really having a hard time figuring out my cat's weight vs. my cat's looks vs. whatever some normal ranges would be for an animal of her kind/size.

She's a domestic shorthair cat, 12 months old.

When we got her, she was 8 months and weighed 7 pounds 3 ounces and the vet said she was skinny and a bit underweight. At that point, she looked like this.

Now she weighs around 9 and a half pounds (she was about 8 pounds 3 ounces three months ago when we had her spayed). She's a pretty big cat - compared to a 2 year old longhair domestic male who comes to our deck, she's, well, just about the same length, height.

I just can't tell if she's overweight or, overall, if she's eating right. Right now, she looks like this or this.

She's pretty active. Doesn't go out on her own (harness/leash combo a few times a week, etc.), but she runs around the house and we also play with her a lot.

I feed her premium foods, almost completely wet diet, too. She eats about 2.5 ounces in the morning and then another 2.5 in the evening. For lunch and late snack (the latter needs to happen to keep her from waking me up in the middle of the night), she gets less than 1/8 of a cup (combined) of premium kibble. All this seems to be way under any and all requirements from the actual manufacturers sites, as well as just about any other info I've seen. For a while, she ate like a little pig, literally swallowing the entire blob of wet food at once, but for the past week or so, she's actually taking her time to eat and even makes a short break during her meal (one serving of wet is now gone within an hour, as opposed being eaten within 1-3 minutes). She eats Wellness canned, Wellness CORE, Merrick 5 star and Merrick Before Grain (wet and some dry) as well as Soulistic.

How do I find out if she's too heavy? Should I cut down on her meals? By how much? I'm even thinking about scheduling an appointment with a vet just to.. well, I am not sure what exactly. Her vet has been great, in terms of getting the standard procedures done and giving me some standard tips on how to be a first-time cat owner, but she's also recommends Meow Mix as really good cat food.

I've had an overweight dog once (I was a kid and didn't know better, and then on top of that she ended up with epilepsy which limited her lifestyle even more) and I would really like to make sure my cat doesn't turn into a furry ball eihter.

Thanks in advance!

I'm not exactly a pro, but using my own cats as a reference, your kitty seems to be a good size. 9lbs is more or less average. If she is overweight, it may not be by much at all. She is on a diet of great food, and according to you, is pretty active and gets lots of play time.

Here is a link that explains how to tell if your cat is at an ideal weight. (Assessing Your Cat's Weight)

http://www.thecatsite.com/Health/93/...verweight.html

Your kitty is very pretty, by the way.

In your recent pic, from the top it doesn't appear she has much if any waist, there should be an indent after the ribs, you should be able to easily feel but not see her ribs. Based on the pic I would say she could lose a bit, but she she isn't obese or anything. IME most vets say nothing about weight, my sisters vet especially, they have a horribly obese diabetic "office" cat, my sis' cat is massively fat, my coworkers cat tore the tendons in his legs and couldn't walk for 6 months because he was so fat for so many years and apparently the whole time the vet has never said a thing about it! But happily sold her "prescription" weight loss crap.

Thank you both for your help.

I can see her waist in the morning, or before pretty much any meal. Once she eats her stuff, she literally inflates a bit. I can also count her ribs just fine.

But she still kind of looks like a puff ball of some sort.