Back in January, when the Kitten Lounge’s opening was announced, it was just supposed to be a placeholder—albeit a very cute one. The lounge with wee felines roaming around would be open for four months in the M Street storefront that Crumbs & Whiskers, its parent cat cafe, would later move into.

Eight months and about 200 adopted kittens later, the Kitten Lounge says it will remain open indefinitely, and Crumbs & Whiskers will remain at its original location a few blocks away.

“We knew it’d be cute, we knew it’d cause a big impact and teach people about kitten season, but it just exceeded our expectations,” says Loran Kraljevski, chief creative officer for Crumbs & Whiskers.

The Kitten Lounge offers “kitten experiences” of 30 or 70 minutes, for $20 or $35, respectively. Food and drink is available via a partner cafe. According to Kraljevski, where the cat cafe is “a nice cafe when you can just sit, enjoy a cappuccino, and cuddle with big, fluffy clouds of cats,” the kitten cafe is a lot more energetic. That’s both because it’s spread out on one main floor (the cat cafe is three stories of smaller hangout spaces) and, while both locations have about two dozen felines in rotation at a time, “kittens are constantly bouncing around.”

Kraljevski estimates the number of customers at the Kitten Lounge and the cat cafe are about even, and says both locations have a healthy base of regular visitors. “We have some people who tell us that we are their own supplement to therapy,” she says. “Laying down and letting the kittens cover you is everything they need for the day.” Occasionally there are fan favorites (a handsome guy named Billy was the most popular kitten at the lounge for a while this fall “because he’s got these beautiful baby blues,” Kraljevski says) but all the kittens tend to get some love.

And there are apparently a lot of kittens. The Kitten Lounge was originally timed to operate during kitten season—that’s the spring-to-early fall period when shelters typically receive more kittens. The company works with a pair of rescue groups: Homeward Trails Animal Rescue provides cats for the cat cafe, and Lucky Dog Animal Rescue keeps the lounge stocked with kittens. “And according to them, there’s just more than ever before,” Kraljevski says.

As Jennah Billeter, director of volunteer and foster resources at the Humane Rescue Alliance, points out, it might not be that the season is more intense, it might just be getting longer. “I’ve been here seven years: The first five, we were wrapped up with the big bulk of kitten stuff by the end of October,” she says. “Last year, we were still having a pretty significant number of kittens in foster care even in January.” The HRA took in 791 kittens from January through July 24: up by just over 100 from last year, but still well within its average range from the last six years.

Because cats procreate during warmer months, kitten season might be longer because more of our months are warmer. “Anecdotally, I do think that weather plays a significant role in when kitten season starts and ends,” Billeter says.

The influx of kittens has hit Los Angeles, too, where the bicoastal Crumbs & Whiskers company also opened a Kitten Lounge this summer. As the company rides out this extended kitten season, Kraljevski says, they’re adding more events at the D.C. location. First up is a giveaway for Halloween: If you’re one of the first people to show up at the cat cafe or Kitten Lounge in a cat costume between Oct. 28-31, you’ll receive free admission. Later, the lounge will introduce Kitten Yoga.

As for keeping track of all these new kittens: We’ll have a better idea of where these cats are in about two years, when the D.C. Cat Count tallies its final feline.