Cat's fur to make kitten britches

There's more than one way to skin a cat?! 

That phrase may apply to cat fish but not to Maine Coon cats.

There was no skinning done here, despite what it looks like.

Jemima certainly finds molting revolting; however, it was time for her to shed some excess winter weight in the form of fur.  There was fur everywhere, and the pile in the photo is not representative of all that came off of this one cat. It's amazing that we got such a huge collection of mats & fur, yet the feline still looks remarkable fluffy after the extensive grooming process is over. If only we could think of something worthwhile to do with this mound of fluff (the fur or the feline?) we'd be in business. For fun, I decided to "Google" various uses for cat's fur.

Wow! There are many wacky things one can learn from a little research. This lady who lives in CO found a way to recycle her cat's fur.  She spun the fur into yarn & knit a sweater. I wonder if dander is a problem, or if she sheds when she wears the sweater. Fleas? Hmmm... I also wonder if she gets cat fur on her fur sweater if she holds her cat while wearing said sweater. You'd never be able to tell.

There is another woman in SC who uses chatangora (cat hair yarn) to make adorable handbags. Really! I am not spinning a yarn. She even has her own business aptly named Catty Shack Creations.

I wonder if anyone has come up with a use for hairballs? We get plenty of those, too. I don't think I'll spend any time researching that topic. YUCK! :-(

'Mima's fur found its home in the trash can. Nobody in this house knits.

They are still my little girls...

...and he's still my little boy! 

(I MADE him pose this way -- he was afraid he was crushing my legs!)

What a nice, relaxing Mother's Day I enjoyed. I received nice cards, flowers, a lovely bracelet that Millie made,  a coupon for a mani-pedi outing, & lots o' XOs!

Visit from the Boyce Boy!

Things on Raleigh Court have just not been the same since Nathan moved to T-Town... :-(

We were so glad that he stopped by to visit us, even if it was only for a few hours. I'm glad that I had plenty of red hots on hand!

The long and the short of it

Our house is a hairy home -- between having long-haired cats and long-haired girls, we vacuum often, keep lint rollers handy, and we pour through the shampoo & conditioner. Despite the hairy situation, we like long hair.

Change is good. Right? But not too much change.

Liesey decided to have her tresses trimmed after "Alice in Wonderland" was finished, but the requirement was that it still had to be long enough to go into a bun with minimal effort. Her mane could be shorter, but not TOO short.

Here's what the ballet bun looked like before the hair appointment. It kinda looks like a giant Cinnabon minus the gooey glaze.

"BEFORE"

Debbie at "Article" was the stylist chosen to cut Rapunzel's hair. :-)

Snip, snip here. Snip, snip, there...
and lots of hair on the floor!

The new 'do is about 8 inches (or more) shorter than
the old one, and there are a few light layers in the
front. There wasn't quite enough hair cut off to
donate to Locks of Love, but all that hair did
make a nice contribution to the garbage can.

The "AFTER" photos:

Behind the Scenes

Pictures can tell the tale better than I, so I won't write toooo much about this past weekend's performances of Alice in Wonderland.  It was a full, yet fun, weekend. Millie, Hayley, AJ, Mark, and I attended the fourth & final performance. Of course, it was a wonderful show. :-) 

Tessa posed with Fairies Kyla, Liesey, Emily, and Cheyenne.

Cheshire Ruth

Sienna -- Caterpillar/Butterfly

Liesey the Duchess & Cook Anna

Where's the pig/baby?

The (Lobster?!) Duchess & Friends

A trio of Smiths

(How 'bout that castanet man?!!!)

The Duchess & Fairy Naomi

Darian (The White Rabbit) & Chloe (Alice)

Hayley, Fairy Haley, & Millie

The girls picked some pretty flowers.

The Smithlings were allowed to sleep in this morning. (A homeschooling perk) Ahhh! That's a collective sigh of relief. We may be tired, but this really is a fun family activity, or we wouldn't keep it up.  Alice is the 10th Placer Theatre Ballet production that our family has been associated with, and I have a feeling we'll be participating in many more in the years to come.

Only four months until Nutcracker auditions...

Shake! Shake! Shake!

Who says that you can't teach an old cat new tricks? Well, maybe that has never been said...

Thanks to our friend Janice, we learned that even six year old brown mackerel tabbies can learn to do things on command. Or at least sit & shake "hands" for a treat. :-) It took less than 10 minutes to teach Jemima this new trick. What's next? Roll over? Speak? Fetch? Vacuum the floor? Do the laundry? I am certain that we will progress to more difficult commands as time goes by.

See the video below. The noise in the background is from our fountain. If the water was still you'd be able to hear Jemima purring loudly as she shakes. She LOVES to perform. Bartholomew is somewhat envious of his sister's newly-developed skills, but he will not participate in such an activity as this, even if it does garner a few tasty cat treats. 

We obviously have had too much time on our hands.

Easter 2009

He is Risen!

We had a WONDERFUL day today. We started out by attending an 8 a.m. worship service at Bridgeway Christian Church. After returning home, we all talked to G-ma & G-pa on the phone, sampled the goodies in our Easter baskets, had fun on Raleigh Court with the neighbors, ate dinner, made a quick trip to the airport to pick up AJ & Mark, and ended the day with watching Ben Hur. Of course, I had to make sure that plenty of photos were taken. And we even managed to get a family picture. Hooray! Check out our photos:

Let the hunt begin...

Cre-egg-tivity?

After a trip to Costco, we "hatched" a few eggs on the driveway. We opened the back hatch of the car & out the eggs came. Despite the water conservation mandate that forbids hosing down sidewalks, driveways, etc., I washed the scrambled eggs off the concrete. I am sure that there is some creative design in the yolky mess -- kind of like an ink blot test. What do YOU see?

Not a single egg was spared...

The girls & I did manage to NOT crack any eggs as we learned a new craft -- Pysanky! Thanks to Denise & Nicole, we created some lovely Ukrainian Easter eggs.

Look at that concentration. Look at that skill.

Now she's playing with fire...

Millie & Mimi discussed color selection.

What EGGcellent designs!

Millie was egg-cited about this artsy activity. Her kitty/angel design was purrfect!

I am sure that this is a traditional Ukrainian pose.

All of our eggs are in one basket. We should be okay as long as we don't put 'em in the back of the car.

1/2 of a CENTURY?

Mr. Smith turned 50 today!

The Smithlings gave their daddy four "nearly indestructible" Cornilleau ping pong paddles (with "Michelin Man" surfaces) that should last for another 50 years. (I can just see us all playing table tennis with these paddles and a few canes on D's 100th b-day!) Ha! Ha! I ordered a backgammon set for the guy who likes fun & games; however, it had to be returned as it didn't look as nice in person as it did on-line... He didn't even get to see it, as the game set didn't get past Smith quality control. Isn't that lame that I didn't have a gift for my boy on his special day?! Guess I will need to take him shopping with me. 

I did throw him a FUN party, but that was the easy part. All we needed to do was add great friends -- and a little food. Grilled salmon with pesto, brown rice, spinach salad, Caesar salad, bread, corn on the cob, & Italian sodas were on the menu. YUM!

The inside of the card says, "You will soon!" 

Perhaps our resident quinquagenarian will soon be able 

to explain this great mystery to us.

The black & "old" gold balloons actually matched the napkins & plates that were chosen for Mr. Smith's BIG party. This was not a Purdue Boilermaker-themed event, although it appears that way!

He's 50?  Wow! I must've married a much older guy... HA!

These dear friends created a photo album just for the b-day boy. The book is filled with photos & memories from MANY years of fun with our 

"Family Game Night" family.

What great pictures -- what fun memories!

Nathan is a long way from being 50!

Cool spectacles!

Pettits, Millers, Ericksons, Weihers, & Smiths

Yes, we really had 50 candles on the "cake" -- well, there wasn't just ONE cake. There were 25 gourmet cupcakes of various flavors, and each treat held two candles. It took four people lighting the candles as fast as possible. Then we had to sing quickly to avoid a 3-alarm fire. (The fire extinguisher was handy...) 

In addition to all the chatter, laughter, silliness, and other fun & games, we were all treated to a lively (original) ditty, It's Your Birthday, by the musical Pettit duo.  

What a memorable evening! Thanks to everyone who helped the "old guy" ease into a new decade. The gift of friendship is a blessing, and we are blessed indeed. :-)

179 out of 182

The landscape design was drawn up last summer.
Our friend Debbie did a WONDERFUL job creating our garden.

We patiently waited through fall & winter to begin implementing the plan...

Let the transformation begin!

We borrowed our neighbor's Tundra & loaded up every available spot with the plants on our lengthy list. Well, we got almost all of the plants. We have 179 out of the 182 plants required for the garden plan. We are waiting for our local nursery to sell us 3 pots of Bee Balm. (The girls don't really like this photo because of their sun grins. I think that the plants are grinning, too.)

Some of the favs: Coral Bells, Liriope, Daylilies, Ajuga,
Hydrangea, Geranium, Peonies, & Hostas

Even the back seat of the pickup got loaded up!

This photo was taken a couple of weeks ago --
we only had a handful of plants in the ground at this point.

Lots o' pots!

Millie, Millie, oh, so silly, how does your garden grow? :-)

All three of the Smithlings have helped with this project, but I 

only have one photo of Millie in the garden with her daddy.

"We" still have irrigation work (Mr. Smith's specialty) to complete & lots of "barking" to do, but you can pretty much see how the finished project will look. We are amazed at how quickly things are growing. Let's just hope that California has enough water to keep these plants alive! We're now ready for butterflies & hummingbirds.

Now that you have seen these photos, you know why I have not been adding any new items to my blog this month. I'm in the garden & not at the keyboard.

Wow! It looks as if I need to get our lawn boy out there to give the turf a trim... I guess we have been too busy playing in the dirt to notice that the grass is tall!