What a heartwarming story! Another suggestion: Hills Perscription A/D food from the vet's office is terrific for kittens - it's high calorie, high nutrition; I think it might be specifically for kittens.

I fostered lots of kittens last summer for a rescue group that I work with - the youngest was found in a dumpster at about 3 weeks of age. I hand-fed her using a syringe for several weeks until she would eat on her own. The vet suggested adding some of the A/D food right away (at 3 weeks old) to the KMR mixture to be sure to get good nutrition into her.

It must have worked, because SweetPea McGee has grown up quite happy and healthy (she's now about 7 months old). We flunked fostering too with this one - I got too attached as I was feeding & pottying her every few hours thru the night and taking her with me if I was gone long enough that I had to feed her in the car!

Keep up the good work, and best of luck that she pulls thru the URI. The goopy eyes are probably part of it - sometimes the foster kittens came in with horribly caked gunky eyes along with the resperatory infection. We had an eye ointment from the vet that was helpful - but so was a soft warm washcloth.