Playing with painted stones

Grace and boys discover the cat-painted stones ... and sometimes actually play with them while I have the camera on! Ruse and, later, Grace were playing "soccer" with a couple of them for a while! It's very fun to watch them inspect and play!!

I've had the largest one for a long time, given to me by a friend when I was still teaching in California. The other six are some that I won in a bid, and which Savannah's mom sent me. I love them all. Soooooo darling!

See also the videos linked at the bottom of this post.

Ruse, checking them out

Ruse, still deciding!

Ruse, getting braver ...

... and braver!

Ooops, Ruse wasn't quick enough. Here's Audace, getting in on the game!

And two videos!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO0JIf9_o-M

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYNR8Ctt72w

Our 7th Gotcha Day!!

Seven years ago today, Grace and Audace and Ruse came to live in this house. (I can hardly call it "my house" since it's theirs as well as mine!) What a joyous day that was. 

Here are some photos from that wonderful day!

Austen (age 13) and Grace (age 1)

Austen and two kittens (ages 8 weeks or so)

Kira (age 5) and kitten

Parker (age 10) and kitten

On Hug-a-Cat Day!

Today was Hug-a-Cat day, I think. My three li'l beauties get hugs every day, whether they like it or not!!

Here's Ruse ... just before his hug this morning!!

Happy HAPPY Birthday to our beautiful Grace!

Happy #8 today, Grace, my little love!

All these good colors complement Grace's loveliness!

Our beautiful Grace ... on National Straw Hat Day!

I cannot improve on excellent work. 

I just love this photo of Grace, with her hat included. 

So wonderful!

Happy Momma's Day to Grace!

Happy Momma's Day, Grace! Enjoy, enjoy!

Two of Anne's

First of all, here's Cabbie ... before and after his summer haircut!

Before ...

And after ...

And here are two views of Kitty ... a very floofy cat! He NEEDS a summer haircut!! In the first one, he was looking at me upside-down! 

And here, he was rolling over ... trying to look cute? Begging for food??

Happy Birthday #7 to Audace and Ruse!

... and to Marigold and Mr B, even though we think they have already celebrated in their new forever home with Mama Laura and Maxie!

Here are some pix from this past week (VERY recent!), including one from this morning showing how brilliant Audace is -- he has learned how to keep that food dish from slippy-sliding away from him as he eats!!

Thank you, Grace, for having such beautiful babies.

And, again and again, thank you Auntie Deb and Mommy ML for rescuing all of these li'l beauties!

Happy Easter, everyone

Our joy in the day is reflected in Audace's joyous play!

He loves my shoes and socks!

 He also loves the wonderful sound of tissue paper when he plays with it!

Such a happy boy-cat!!

RIP, Eric

Our hearts are breaking for Eric's family, including his very close bro, Flynn.

Prayers and purrrrrrrsssss of comfort from all of us here ...

Yayyy for new forever homes!! Huge thanks!

We are so thankful to know that Emily and Marigold and Brutus (now known as Mr. B) are all settling in to their new forever homes!

Grace was so happy to hear the good news that she had to wake Ruse up and give him a bath!!

Thanks to Rhonda and Laura for adopting these precious ones!

Hooray!

Well, things are definitely looking up!! Be sure to read about the "re-homing" of The Royals: http://www.blog.catblogosphere.com/re-homing-emily-brutus-marigold/

We are all VERY happy about all this. Grace and I are especially appreciative of all the people who are working and donating money to see to it that The Royals are given new forever homes. We are also grateful to anyone who is donating or has donated to ML, since she's footing all the bills for QM Rose's last needs. Anyone who wants to donate can do so most easily through Paypal, whether he/she has an account there or not. Just send money in these ways:

~ to help ML with Rose's needs: mlgiggleman@gmail.com

~ to help with getting The Royals sprung from the kitty shelter and on their way to their new homes: lcrodgers@sbcglobal.net  and  queenlillycat@aol.com

Let's keep all those donations coming!!

Our hearts are breaking...

In summer, 2006, Rose adopted Grace's other two offspring, Brutus and Marigold, to add to Emily in her household. The loss of Rose will be very hard on these kittehs.

My prayers are that all three are adopted by some lovely people. 

These babies deserve it!

KC and ML's blog will have updates: http://missyblueeyes.blogspot.com

We can all leave our condolences at the Royals' blog: http://roseandtheroyals.blogspot.com

This is crushing news. =(

Fun game for kitteh!

I wonder how long it took for this beauty to learn how to play this game!!

Playful on Caturday!

Audace was unusually playful this morning ... very funny!

HERE's the video! <~~click

Ruse just watched and waited for his brother to calm down!

Wordless!

See Audace, about to attack Zoey, one of the neighborhood cats! 

Audace is our big protector!!

Preferences! LOL!

It's been colder than usual for this late in February ... and it was warmer during most of January than usual, too. But that's all OK, because Grace and her boys don't really know much difference!

On this cold night, though, before I turned the furnace back on, Audace decided he'd rather cuddle up to Ruse for some good snoozin'. Grace, however, likes to keep her distance!

See the empty bed? Audace just wants to keep warm with his bro!

Grace usually likes to snooze near Ruse ...

... or on him ...

... or as close as she can get, even it it means hanging out of her own li'l bed!

When Ruse is cuddling up to his mommy, though, Audace will go off and find somewhere else to snooze ... in this case, one of the hammicks!

They are fairly congenial, but Grace can do without Audace!! 

Auction to help a friend

We have sent photos of many of the kitty books in our bean's collection to be included in this auction to help Sallie and her family with vet costs. 

Read all about Sallie HERE.

Emergency runs to the vet can really rack up the $$$ owed, and we know what that feels like. No fun at all.

Here's Ruse, helping to choose the books!!

And here's a link (click HERE) to the auction.

Let's all help raise the money this family needs!