mom moving kittens to strange places

things had been going very well for my mom cat and her week old babies untill yesterday, I went in to check on them and one of the kittens was lying in the middle of the floor. I moved him back to the nest box (which is in a cozy corner of our quite bedroom), but a few hours later I heard a kitten crying and found another kitten out of the box, this time on the floor in our walk-in closet, which has no carpet, only a cold hardwood. again this morning she left one of the kittens alone on the middle of the bedroom floor. also i have noticed mom cat is spending less and less time in the box with the babies, she is away from them more often than she is in the box. any ideas why she is acting this way? nothing has changed recently that would disturb her and she is not moving the same kitten, it has been different each time. any thoughts, suggestions?

She may be stressed, she may be ill, the kittens may be ill. She needs to be completely confined with these kittens- if you have a closet, clear out part of the floor and put her and the babies inside, block her in with a baby gate. She may just need to move the nest to a better place, one she picks not one you do. She may be upset because the bedding needs to be changed, there are so many reasons why momcats move kittens- but they just do. If you have her in a high traffic area, she could be distressed from that.

Hissy has given you excellent advice and reasoning for your girl behaving the way she is - confining her in a clean, warm nest away from the normal traffic of the house is best right now.

Are the babies crying at all when Mom leaves them or are they piled up sleeping? If they are crying and anxious, you may need to start bottling them to make sure they are getting enough to eat. If they are piled up asleep, then leave them be, but make sure Mom's nipples look OK - is there any redness or swelling around any of her nipples? If so, it could be mastitis and she should be seen by the vet now.

Otherwise, how are the babies looking and acting? Are their little tummies full and rounded or do they have a wrinkled look? Do they feel warm to you or ... ? How about the area around the imbilical stump? Do you notice anything out of the ordinary there? Redness, heat or swelling?

What about Mom? Is she eating and drinking OK? Are her litter box habits normal for her?

My foster Momma kept wanting to move her babies. I ended up giving her the cat carrier lined with clean towels, so she could move them into that. But I also kept her locked in a large cage with them at times, because like you said she would move one at a time, and I was afraid a baby would get cold or miss a meal. She did move them several times between the carrier and the cage.

Now, thank goodness, they are old enough to walk and find her if she moves them, so some of my worries are over. They were 3 weeks old last saturday!

the babies do cry sometimes. mom cat has been comming up to me and meowing alot too. she is eating, drinking and using the litter normally, i have also been giving her a small bowl of kmr once a day as a supplament and she is eating this. her nipples seem normal. the two biggest babies have round tummies, but on the other 3 the skin is looser and a bit wrinkly. the unbilicle cords have all fallen off and do not look red or infected.
we moved the nest box into the closet earlier today since this seems to be her favorite spot and she has not moved them since, but she hasn't shown much interest in staying in the box either..

Perhaps she thinks the box is too small, my cat tried moving her babies until we put her in a large dog crate. Then she was fine.

The large dog crate works for me too - I can confine my girl in with her babies and she is fine and quite happy to take care of them. I let her out several times a day while the babies are sleeping so she can stretch, run about for a while and get some lovins from her "Daddy" (she bonded very closely with my husband).