Coaster Turned Cat Toy

 My cats aren’t spoiled. 

You can stop laughing now.  I know my cats are spoiled. It can’t be helped.  I am pretty sure it is in my genetic makeup to spoil cats. 

You might ask why I brought up my cats being spoiled.  It is because I am going to tell you about turning a coaster into a cat toy. Or a perhaps this a just another tale of craft adaptability to prevent a Pinterest fail. 

On Pinterest I found the idea for really cute cat coasters made out of extra fabric and quilt batting.  (Website for pattern is www.sewverycrafty.com) While we have nice coasters in our living room, I thought the cat coasters would be nice for the upstairs. The weather is getting warmer and cold drinks tend to sweat. I would like to have cold drinks in the sewing room with out worrying about messing up the wood.

The instructions for this pattern are easy to follow. They even provide a template for the coasters.  I did not download the template. I thought that I would be brilliant and eyeball it. After all it is just a cat head shape.  This is were it could almost be considered a fail. 

My recommend is to download the template. While I don’t think mine turned out terrible. I do think that the end product was supposed to be bigger.  Due to the size of my cat coaster, (or would it be called a kitten coaster?) I thought it would make the perfect cat toy for my feline friends. 

Instead of sewing the coaster shut, I shoved it full of catnip. And then when I thought I couldn’t get any more catnip in it, I used a chopstick to makes sure there was catnip in the ears and compress the catnip in the toy. I then sewed the side shut. 

While Dib was interested while I was making the toy, once it was complete he wandered off to cause chaos in other areas of the house.  I presented the toy to Nami to see if she had any interest.  While she didn’t attack me, she didn’t really want to get up from her nap either.  Iggins is the one that had the most interest, and that might be due to him being the most awake during prime time nap time. It may also be due to him thinking that anything orange belongs to him, since he is orange. It really is hard to tell.

Long story short, is I would recommend using this pattern to make cute cat toys, but adding a step of filling it with cat nip. It is a cute toy and is easily customizable based on your fabric pattern choices. 

Love Notes

 Often things are not as bad as they seem.  

It is all a matter of perspective. I was reminded of this when I tried a recipe out of The Baking with Kim Joy cookbook. Kim Joy was a contestant on The Great British Bake-off who makes ridiculously cute eats. Most of them are almost too cute to want to eat.  I was gifted her cookbook recipe for Christmas and used Mother’s Day as an excuse to try something out of. 

This is what  I was trying to make.

This is what they looked like coming out of the oven.

This is what they looked liked iced.

The entire time making them I was nervous. I am admittedly more of a cook than a baker. Baking is really precise with measurements and if you don’t follow it exactly then the chemical reactions in the bake will be off and it won’t turn out right.  Cooking is more forgiving. If you screw too terribly cover it in cheese or gravy.  Many things have been fixed with cheese, gravy or both. (This is where my theory on the creation of Poutine is pretty sound.) 

While I agonized over how imperfect the bake was and how Paul Hollywood would hate it, I forgot something very important.  These treats were not for Paul Hollywood. They were for my mother in law. My mother in law didn’t see how shaky my icing was, or how imperfect the envelopes were shaped. She saw how much effort my husband and I put into making them for her. We did everything from making the jelly from scratch to rolling the short bread to keeping the cats from tasting them.  It was an adventure that I was able to have with my husband for a beloved member of the family that appreciated our efforts.  

Sometimes you have to step back take a breathe and give yourself a break.  It is about perspective and the hardest  view to change is your own.  Often things are not as bad as they seem. 

Cat Aprons

 I made aprons.  They do not fit my cats.  

I want it to be noted that my cats were not at all helpful in trying on aprons. They were not thrilled about any of the colors or patterns available to them. They in fact would rather play with the apron strings, then to actually wear an apron.

It is times like these, that make me thankful that several of my friends have cute tiny spawn. The failure for cat aprons (that the cats insist they never wanted in the first place) is a victory for small humans.  Several small humans in my hemisphere have been gift with aprons.  The cats are relieved.

Truth:  This was a Pinterest experiment. Nowhere in the instructions does it say it can be used for cats.  In fact the pattern that I used was called “Ann Kelle - Childs Apron Tutorial”. There is nothing that pattern that specifies this can be used for fur children, but also there is nothing specifies that this cannot be used for fur children.  If you are sewing inclined, I would recommend this pattern. It was easy to follow and turned out well for tiny humans.

Cemetery Picnic

What do you pack for a picnic at a cemetery?

Okay.  I should probably back up. For Mother’s Day, I took my mother to a cemetery for a picnic. This is not a hint to my mother that she has one foot in the grave and not a me being dramatic and exaggerating the truth.  The truth is, I did take my mother to a cemetery.  The cemetery in question is about an hour away and is the cemetery that hold the remains of the first generation of our family in America.  Pretty exciting stuff if you are interested in family history/ genealogy.  Since the cemetery is about an hour a way, it makes sense to bring a picnic and refreshment, which bring me back to my original question. 

What do you pack for a picnic at a cemetery?

Do you go full funeral meal and bring cold salads and finger food? Do you liven it up and play off a Halloween theme? Do keep it to traditional picnic food? These questions rolled around in my head, until I did a mash up of all three.

Cemetery Picnic Menu

Chicken Salad on Onion Rolls with Cheese and Tomato

Deviled Eggs

Marinated Mushrooms

Mozzarella and Tomato

Strawberries

Dirt Cups. (Chocolate Pudding with crushed Oreo’s and Gummy Worms)

What would you pack for your picnic?

Album Art Appreciation

 There was a great mental debate on writing about my Mother’s Day plans and in the end I have decided to hold off and write about it at a later date. Mostly because I don’t want to provide any spoilers to my mother and mother in law.   Instead I will talk about something that both my mother, mother in law and myself have in common and that is art appreciation. 

My husband is a connoisseur of vinyl records. It is his hobby and he is constantly on the hunt for new music. He has a talent for finding obscure and often very interesting records. While not all the records are to my musical taste, some of the art on the album covers is remarkable.   Below are 11 gems from the record collection that I think have interesting album jackets.

1. Monomyth - Exo - This is amazing because not only is the jacket a space trip, the inside is fascinating to look at.
2. Comacozer- Binbeal - I love how psychedelic this is. 
3. Orphans of Doom - I am not going to lie, I picked this one because of the octopus.  The flowers and octopus is beautiful to me.
4. Alunah - Amber &Gold - I feel like this one could be the cover to several fantasy novels. It reminds me of a fallen angel in the garden of eden with the apples and wings. 
5. Book of Worms - Remythologizer - This is the exact type of fantasy novel that I would have bee drawn to. The more you look at it the more details you see. 
6. The Pilgrim - Walking into the Forest - This reminded me of the sort of folk music that I enjoy. 
7. Slift - Ummon - This is another amazing one that the out side of the jacket is just as interesting as the inside of the jacket. 
8. The Well - Pagan Science - This I would expect to see in a museum. 
9. Waveshaper- Artifact - I love how retro and futuristic it is. I makes me think of an 80’s set in what they thought the future would look like.
10. Turned to Stone Volume 2- Masamune and Maramasa- Howling Giant- Sergeant Thunderhoof -  There is so much going on in this.  The more you look at it, the more details you see.
11. The Greasy Gills- The Spring Collection - This album cracked me up. It made me laugh.

Filling the Bag

My mother gave me a box of zippers. I have been practicing by making zipper bags. After about a dozen bags, I needed to come up with a purpose for the bags. I cannot keep giving away the random bags. 

I decided to make some of the bags into a To Go Kit. Or as my husband has called it a The Girl Kit. (In truth my husband did back peddle beautifully and renamed it The Non Gender Specific Kit.)

The idea behind the kit is to keep it in the car and use it when needed. It isn’t a first aid kit.  

Here is what is in the kit so far:

1. Hand Sanitizer
2. Allen Wrench (hex key)
3. Bands Aids
4. Alcohol Wipes
5. Lint Roller
6. Floss
7. Tooth Paste
8. Bobby Pins
9. Sunblock
10. Hand Lotion
11. Face Mask
12. Magnifying glass
13. Nail File
14. Sole Savers
15. Hot Chocolate
16. Vanity Kit (cotton balls and cotton swabs)
17. Pads/ Tampons
18. Face Mask
19. Shampoo
20. Makeup wipe
21. Safety Pins 

Other than a cup of tea, is there anything that you think is missing in this kit?  

The Sad Cupcake

 You can’t be sad when you’re holding a cupcake. My dear friend Faye, gave me this magnet. It made me laugh and I thought it was the truth. Then I found an exception to that.  When that cupcake is a lie, the phrase misery loves company comes to mind. 

Welcome to a story about a terrible cupcake.

My friend Nic is a vegan. A gluten free vegan. Being vegan and gluten free is not a terrible thing. I have had some amazing vegan food and gluten free food in my life. While it is not my way of life, I am open to trying new recipes. Nic wanted to make red velvet vegan gluten free cupcakes.  She found a recipe on the internet. 

This is proof that the internet is a cruel and terrible place. They looked like cupcakes. They tasted like misery and tragedy. Of course I brought one home for my husband to try. After all, what if they were fine and I was just being super critical? (Truth: Misery loves company and I needed someone else to be just as traumatized as I was over the experience.) I have never seen a person spit a cupcake out of their mouth so quickly. My husband might never forgive me for the cupcake betrayal.

Things that were wrong with the cupcake:

1. Texture - It was crumbly yet gummy, like it lacked the will to live, but was trying anyway
2. Flavor-It did not taste like red velvet. It did not taste like chocolate. It tasted somewhat nutty.
3. Icing- The recipe had described it as tangy. Tangy is not something an icing should ever be. I am pretty sure my husband described it a barf. 

Lesson learned. Be wary of anything that is mostly held together by maple syrup, coconut oil and optimism.  Thank you Nic for reminding me that cupcakes can be deceiving. Happiness is not always a cupcake.

The Ugly Potato Alien

 E.T is an ugly potato of an alien.  

I may have made the ugliest pillows ever.  I say this,because I used left over E.T fabric that was used in the pop culture quilt I made my brother.  I do not understand  the love for E.T. He isn’t all that appealing or even interesting. In fact, I can name ten aliens that are more appealing than E.T.  

The E.T. Go Home List

1. Chewbacca 
2. Mork
3. Alf
4. Ewoks
5. Xenomorph
6. Predator 
7. Zaphod Beeblebrox
8. The Thing
9. Triffids
10. Dr. Who

How many aliens can you name that are more interesting than E.T?   Also- Is Predator the name of the actual species or does it have something more scientific?

A Toy for Iggins

If I was a better cat mom, I would have written about Iggins on his birthday. Instead I just now remembered that I forgot his birthday and instead I am going to talk about the nice thing I made for Iggins for his unbirthday. 

I am not a naturally creative person. I am a person that does an excellent job at following instructions. If someone else comes up with the idea, I am decent at following instructions on how to create it. I am not normally an originator in the craft world.  I bring this up, because this is one of the rare moments where I did not pull a craft off of Pinterest.  I made Iggins a cat toy that he actually appreciates and is not a random twisty tie or wine cork. 

Supplies:

1 Finger Puppet

Loose dried catnip

Needle

Thread

Instructions:

Acquire a finger puppet. If there is a Ten Thousand Villages near you, they have a wide variety of finger puppets for a decent price. I picked up a piggy for my Iggy. (Iggins is my Piggins) Once you have you the finger puppet, stuff it full of the cat nip. You want it in until the finger puppet is stiff. Thread the needle and stitch the end closed.  This is an easy toy to make and has been Iggins tested and approved. 

Do You See It?

 A few weeks ago  I took a picture of the dress I was wearing, because I thought I saw a goat demon in the pattern.  The next day I was out shopping and the store clerk was wearing the same dress and I had to resist the urge to to ask her if she bought the dress for the devil goats.  Somehow I doubt I would have been welcomed back into the store if I brought it up. If not banned, at the very least I would be  watched with a side eye every time I browsed the racks. I get the impression that would people would rather knowingly wear a demonic goat dress then accidentally wear a demonic goat dress.

I bring up the the demonic goat dress, not because it is a frequent rotation in my wardrobe, but because it is a catalyst of trying to unsee patterns. Today, I was walking down the stairs and I am sure that there is an evil clown blowing a kiss in the carpet print.  Now that I see the clown, I can’t not see the clown.  Do you see it?

If you don’t let me help you.  The clown is outlined in blue and he is definitely blowing you a kiss. 

This might be a sign that I need to replace the carpet going up the stairs, or embrace my inner evil clown. I am going to vote for replace the carpet.

Fangs

 I read. It seems like forever since I wrote about anything I have read. Most of  what I have read lately is stuck in the obscurity of fan fiction.  With that being said, I have just finished the most charming graphic novel.  Fangs by Sarah Andersen might be my favorite love story between a vampire and a werewolf.  

I adore this book. It made me smile and chuckle all through reading it. There characters are likable. The art is clean and uncomplicated. It is pokes humor in unexpected ways.   If you were ever in need of a gift for a friend this would be a go to gift. 

The Emily Challenge

 The Emily Challenge

I have a coworker who is an over achiever. Every month she takes on a different challenge. One month she gave up alcohol. Another month it was carbs. One time it was sweets. It is always something different and isn’t always food related. She does this with her significant other and it always provides insight to her and others.  One insight it has provided me as an observer is that I would rather Emily give up alcohol than carbs. Emily is much happier with carbs in her life then out of her life. Another insight is that there is always something to learn about yourself. With this said I am going to take an Emily challenge.  Emily has challenged me to write everyday for at least a month on my blog.  

So, here I am, writing in what feels like forever and seeing several blog posts that were started and never published.  I am not sure what I am going to write about, but it wouldn’t be a challenge if I had a plan.  Welcome to Day 1 out of 31 Days of writing madness. Or as I call it and will probably grumble over it as the Emily Challenge.  We will see what I learn by the end of it and maybe just maybe I would be considered an overachiever.