Sparkle the Designer Cat's Blog, page 400

Why Binga Wasn’t in Yesterday’s Photo

Well, it wasn’t planned to begin with, but she decided to invite herself in! Here is what happened (move your pointer over the photos for the secret messages… although the photos tell the story well enough!).

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

The True Christmas Spirit

As many of you may have gathered, we are not really having Christmas here. My human wanted to put up the fake tree and the decorations, but she had so much work to do on the cat rescue anthology that is coming out at the end of January that she never found the time. And the humans here are having a pretty awful year financially for a bunch of different reasons, so they aren’t even giving each other gifts, much less anyone else. And I decided that instead of gifts for myself, I wanted to help other kitties who don’t have homes yet — and that became the Santa Kitty Toy Hop. So even there had been a tree, there would have been nothing to put under it this year.

But as you know, the spirit of Christmas, and the whole holiday season, isn’t really about getting gifts at all. Some say it’s about giving, but that’s not quite right either. The true spirit of Christmas, especially for secular households like the one I live in, is both simpler and deeper. Christmas is about caring.

Caring does not necessarily have anything to do with gift giving. It is about being thoughtful and looking out for your fellow creatures. My human says that when she brought the toys for the blog hop to the Kitten Rescue kitties, it wasn’t the toys that were important, but the time she took to play with the adult kitties, who don’t get enough interactive play in their life. Just giving a gift does not do that. Taking action to make someone’s life better, even if it is not costing you anything, is what is important.

So this Christmas, think about what you can do to make someone happy, or to help them if they are suffering. It does not have to be money or stuff. It can be words. It can even be sitting and just being there for them. I do a lot of that with my human. And actually, I think she needs that more than she needs a lot of the other things she thinks she does. And I have a sneaking suspicion that she knows it, too.

Merry Christmas. Happy holidays. Let the spirit of the season live within you. Now can I take off this Santa sweater? I outgrew it about three months ago!
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

My Holiday eCards 2014

Every year, Sparkle had the tradition of posting all the eCards she got from pals in one long post, and linking to their blogs. I’m carrying on this tradition. If you see an unfamiliar face that intrigues you, visit them! Merry Catmas!

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

My Week in Pictures

Most of these have shown up in one form or another on Instagram, and we’re not really having Christmas, so there’s nothing festive, but this has been my week so far. Scroll over the photos for secret messages.

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Human Things… and Their Feline Equivalent

Humans can be so puzzling. Some of their strange behaviors seem to defy explanation. But I’ve been taking notes since I’ve come to live here in August, and I figured the best way to explain some of these human things is in feline terms. I hope it helps your humans seem less mysterious!

This is the first installment of a running series!

Standing under running water, or soaking in a big tub of water.

Feline equivalent: bathing

Sometimes you have to feel sorry for humans. Because of their physical lacks, simple things like keeping clean become complicated procedures. Like taking a bath. We kitties merely use our tongues (and sometimes our teeth to get at the occasional knot or sore spot) and we’re good to go. Humans have neither our flexibility nor our barbed tongues — plus I hear that human saliva is actually kind of icky and toxic — so they must figure out other ways to clean themselves. I am not sure why they decided that water would do the trick, but that is exactly their purpose when they step behind the plastic curtain or glass door and turn those knobs. Crazy, isn’t it?

It gets even weirder. Because of the toxic nature of their saliva, humans have to use a different cleaning agent, so they invented this stuff that is full of chemicals and smells like fake foliage, fruit, or some fantasy they made up, and that’s what they use. They rub it all over themselves with a rag or a brush or plastic mesh thing so they can reach the areas that are difficult with their limited flexibility. Then they rinse it all off and that is what they consider “clean.” Except they still kind of smell like the chemicals.

But they aren’t done yet. Unlike when kitties bathe, they aren’t just a little bit damp — they are sopping, so they need to dry themselves off with a towel. And if they have lots of hair on their head and got it wet, they use a loud air machine to blow it dry. If they are like my human, this also involves the addition of more gels and the use of a big, round brush.

Are you exhausted yet? I am! For us cats, bathing and grooming in a nice sun puddle is a pleasurable, relaxing activity. Perhaps humans try to capture some of that when they are soaking in a tub, even though getting all wrinkly in a bunch of water seems like the antithesis of relaxing.

Of course, humans being humans, they think their way is better — which is why, when I’m getting ready for a show, I have to get a human-style bath. So I’ve bathed both human style and kitty style, and I can assure you, we kitties are the ones who are doing it right.
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

About My Pirate Photo Shoot

If you Like my Facebook page, you may have seen this pirate photo of me a few weeks ago. My human was trying to come up with a caption for a card and we were looking for suggestions. Nobody came up with something exactly right, but they did inspire something she will probably use. Scroll over my photo if you want to see what it is.

The whole reason this photo shoot came about was that my human was shopping one afternoon, and saw a bunch of nutcrackers as different characters — and there were only two that were pirates! Plus they were 50% off. So she grabbed the less shabby-looking one and brought it home. And made me put on the pirate costume again for a bunch of pictures. One even wound up in my 2015 calendar:

It is September’s photo, of course, because that is when “Meow Like a Pirate Day” happens!

But it took a while to get some really good shots.

I confess: I tried to eat the nutcracker pirate’s hat.

I did not mind wearing the costume, even though the hat kept falling over, because it meant I got to play with my favorite Neko Fly!

I did get tired after a while — all that modeling is hard work!

I also started goofing off… but can you blame me? Even if I’m competing in cat shows as an adult, I’m still just a nine-month-old kitten!
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Yes, I Have a 2015 Calendar!

But just barely! My human was not going to make one because she had basically only three months of photos to choose from, and she actually hates doing them! According to her, this is the eleventh time she has said, “Never again!” Zazzle’s interface for putting images on their products is difficult and not very professional or exact and she hates that.

But then she realized she didn’t have a calendar for 2015 for herself! So she quickly made one up. There’s no text or cool sayings — just the best landscape-oriented photos she could find of me that could have “bleeding edges” (I still don’t know what that means). Of course, since it’s a calendar, she couldn’t put it together without messing it up — the first one, she accidentally used the 2014 Zazzle calendar template (why is that even still live?), so she had to delete that and redo it all.

But it’s done now, and it’s live on the Zazzle shop if you want one. She hasn’t proofed it because she just created it yesterday. But it should look fine, since she is used to how her photos reprint on Zazzle now.

You can see it, and get it here. And between now and December 31, you get 15% off with the code CALENDAR2015. Zazzle may have other deals for calendars at some point, but the 15% off one will be around for a while.
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Sunday Catinee: Catmas Trees

There’s nothing more cozy looking than a kitty curled up under the Christmas tree. But not all cats are satisfied with merely napping. What happens when cats love Christmas trees too much? This video tells the story… over and over again!

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube.

Leave it to Cole and Marmalade’s humans to come up with a solution. They’ve created the ultimate Christmas cat tree in the awesome video below!

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube.

Could your human be this inventive?
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

The Caturday Report: Heartwarming Holiday Edition

To celebrate the holiday season, I am sharing cat stories that will make you feel good!

Here are five reasons to celebrate this week:

The Koret Shelter Medicine Program at UC Davis and the Maddie’s Shelter Medicine Program at the University of Florida are teaming up with hundreds of North American animal shelters to launch the Million Cat Challenge. Find out how they plan to save the lives of adoptable cats in shelters here!
Raising money for cancer research by watching cat videos? Tom O’Connor and Eddie Peña aim to do just that with their new website!
Residents of Houston, TX, rejoice! The Hello Kitty plane is coming your way in 2015.
Here is a total feel-good blog post for you from Pawesome Cats: three awesome cat adoption stories from Petsmart Charities.
Here is yet another DIY holiday ornament, this one from Kitty Cat Chronicles — !

This week had me feeling pretty good, especially because I got to feature two giveaways!

I started off the week with my Neko Nappers Sleeping Bag giveaway.
Last weekend’s cat show was my first in TICA as an adult alter… and I did pretty well!
I also announced my MeowWorld swag winner!
How fun! I was on the actual set of Bird TV instead of just watching through a window.
You don’t have to have an Instagram account to see my photos there because I’ve shared a few with you!
And I am giving away a Purrk! Playfuls cat toy with silvervine! Find out how much fun they are!

If you see a good cat-oriented news item around the internet, send me a link and I may include it next week!
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!

I Love Vitakraft Purrk! Playfuls with #felinesilvervine – and You Can Win One!

Disclosure: This post is sponsored by Vitakraft and the BlogPaws Professional Pet Blogger Network. I am being compensated for helping spread the word about Purrk! Playfuls, but I only share information on sparklecat.com that i feel is relevant to my readers. Vitakraft is not responsible for the content of this article.

I am so excited! I was sent some cat toys from the Vitakraft Purrk! Playfuls line to try out. The really cool thing is that they contain silvervine, a catnip alternative many of you know about! I’ve never had it before, but I’ve heard that 3 out of 4 cats prefer silvervine toys over toys with catnip — and they play longer with silvervine-infused toys too.

Here is what I got to test: a Purrk! Playfuls Perky Bird and Busy Bee. Plus a packet of silvervine refills that will last a long time. So let’s get started!

I started off with the Perky Bird. Fortunately, my human opened the package herself so I did not have to chew it open.

The moment my human handed the toy to me, I could smell something different about it. Very different!

I don’t usually play with plastic toys, but the silvervine that was right inside the Perky Bird really intrigued me.

And I couldn’t keep my paws — or mouth — off it! That silvervine is some powerful stuff.

Binga wanted to check out the Perky Bird, but I wouldn’t let her! And I am usually not that rude. I couldn’t help it. I was having too much fun!

Next, I got to play with the Busy Bee! It’s a cool looking winged bug on a wire — and it comes with a bonus pack of silvervine!

I love this type of toy and I was after it immediately!

The Busy Bee never knew what hit it!

Your human can insert the wand end into the doorknob attachment for when she has to take a break from playing with you. Or she can do what my human did and use the doorknob attachment as a handle! That makes the Busy Bee especially unpredictable and fun to play with!

I enjoyed the Busy Bee so much that my human brought it to the cat show to keep up my energy.

And also used it for my home photo shoots to keep me bright eyed.

Of course, freshening up the Busy Bee with the silvervine helped lots for my bright eyes!

As you can see above, there are seven cat toys in the Purrk! Playfuls line, plus the refill packet (which includes a bonus toy). In addition to the Busy Bee, there’s a Bouncy Butterfly, and there are also a plastic Frisky Fish and Marvy Mouse in addition to the Perky Bird. Plus two toys I didn’t get to try out that look totally fun: the Deep Sea Bug and the Desert Bug! You can get Vikakraft Purrk! Playfuls online at Amazon.

Best of all, you have a chance to win one of these toys, plus the refill packet! Just enter below. Leave a comment at the very end of this post, then come back to the Rafflecopter widget and say you did, plus leave me your email address — then you are entered! You will have other options to get more entries too. The giveaway closes Tuesday, December 30. The Vitakraft humans will pick the toy for the winner. I know you will love these toys — I sure did!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway ends Tuesday, December 30 at 11:59 P.M. Pacific Time. Open only to residents of the lower 48 U.S. states. Must be 18+ to enter. Winners can only win once across all blogs participating. No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited. Winner has 48 hours to respond before a new winner is selected.
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” Sparkle had answers to many annoying problems in her two award-winning books! Visit her author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of her awesome Dear Sparkle books!