Astrid Photo Experiment

ANOTHER RAZZBERRY SELFIE FROM KIZMET

Sunday Selfies: Week #432

Grey cat with tongue out and showing some fang in a Christmas inspired frame.

After being away for a few days, our humans thought we would be happy to see them. Not so much, actually! C.J. and I are the only ones hanging out with them. Chris and Etna treated us very well proving that our mom and dad are completely extraneous when it comes to our happiness and welfare. And don’t even get me started about that dog, Lula. It’s one thing to leave us, but then to spend days fraternizing with a dog—totally unacceptable and unforgivable. It’s going to take mountains of treats to get back in our good graces!

I may have agreed to take a selfie, but I did not agree to hide my displeasure. I’m giving one of my famous razzberries with a little fang thrown in for good measure.

And now those same inconsiderate humans claim to be super tired when all they did yesterday was sit in the car for hours and hours and hours. Okay, so they might be a smidge over-the-hill and tire easily, but I would think they’d appreciate an entire day of car sitting.

Anyhoo, enough about them. They really aren’t very important when it come to sharing a selfie. I really hope you like by my selfie with catitude. Torties aren’t the only ones that can do catitude properly.

All my fursibs and I hope you had a terrific Thanksgiving and were not abandoned as we were. We also hope you’ll post a selfie and join us our our hop. Remember, you don’t have to post today, you can join us anytime through Thursday.

On behalf of all the Kitties Blue, thanks for popping over to see us as well as for commenting on this post and being. our friends.

Purrs and paw-pats, Kizmet

Photo by the post author: Janet Blue

ASTRID’S ROMANTIC CATURDAY ART

If not for my tongue, the photo used today for my Caturday Art would have been deleted. Mom doesn’t remember if I moved or she did, but the original photo is totally out of focus. That actually worked to my advantage when it came to this creation as it made the photo more romantic.

Mom added two effects and the frame using funny.pho.to. That’s it. Amazing, huh? No kitchen sink this week! But you know she wasn’t satisfied with that. She had to add the HDR filter from Picasa to come up with the variation on the right. We think this is nice, but both like the original better.

This is our submission for Athena Cat Goddess Wise Kitty’s fun Caturday Art blog hop. If you haven’t started exploring your artistic side, what’s stopping you? With all the free, on-line, photo-editing apps, anyone can do it. And it is a super way to salvage cute but bad photos. If you decide to enter or just want to see all the submissions, click on Athena’s badge.

Goody, goody, tomorrow is Sunday, which means our Sunday Selfies Blog Hop. Not sure who’ll be hosting tomorrow. We kitties will have to have a confab to decide if it’ll be one of us or a guest. Entries last week were pretty light, only 50 including Lisbeth in her tiara. If you normally pawticipate but are starting to tire of the hop, let us know. If you’re still with us, we look forward to seeing you tomorrow.

As you all know, our friend, Sammy, is King of the Teasers, but I’d like to leave you with a teaser today. In less than two weeks I have a really big announcement to make. Something super exciting happened a couple of weeks ago, which will lead to an even more exciting event in June. If you have a guess as to what’s up, let me know in the comments.

Ciao for now.

Purrs and paw-pats, Astrid with elebenty bazillion kisses for Sampy

March 12, 2016 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Art Blog Hop Kitty Written Blog 24

IS IT SPRING YET?

Where’s Spring

We are already seriously OVER winter. Though the temperature, which was five degrees two nights ago, has been going up slightly each day (and we are not in the serious deep-freeze that some of our furiends are experiencing), neither Mom nor any of us will be happy until we see something approaching 50 degrees.

To fight the winter blahs, Mom decided to create a spring-like offering for Athena and Marie’s Caturday Art Blog Hop. When she saw this photo with all the vibrant colors it screamed spring to her; though, it was taken indoors. We are going to do our post backwards today and show the original photo first so you can see its unaltered spring qualities.

Spring-Like Caturday Art

spring

Mom’s only regret was that she could not crop out more of the blinds, but she didn’t want Astrid to be tailless. Of course, she ended up losing half of it anyway in the final photo.

spring

The art piece was created using three overlays, one filter and one frame in piZap as well as a border and drop shadow effect in Picasa.

Now, don’t you feel as if spring is just a bit closer? Stay inside and keep your nose and toes warm. Maybe you can convince yourself that mean Mr. Winter has been kicked to the curb!

To add your own art to the hop or to view other submissions, click on Athena and Marie’s badge.

Sunday Selfies Reminder

We will be hosting our Sunday Selfies Blog Hop tomorrow. Sure hope you’ll snap a photo or two and join us. Some of you are getting quite masterful when it comes to taking selfies. We haven’t decided yet who gets the ~~honor~~ torture session at our house tomorrow.

Purrs and paw-pats, Lily Olivia, Mauricio, Misty May, Giulietta, Fiona, Astrid, Lisbeth and Calista Jo

January 10, 2015 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Art Blog Hop Kitty Written Blog 33

ASTRID DREAMS OF TELEPORTING

Caturday Art Blog Hop

Today’s Caturday Art with Astrid dreaming of teleporting was created using multiple overlays in PicMonkey with a final layer added in Picasa. I took my usual more is more approach and kept adding and subtracting to the colorful and sparkling background to give Astrid her out-of-this-world look.

I added two layers of “Bokah” shapes hearts. You can see a couple of them to the left of Astrid. I also added two separate layers of “Bokah” shapes stars, and some of those are visible to Astrid’s right. I included three layers of “Radiance” in different colors. Overkill…yes! But I really like it; even though, all the additions made Astrid look a little angry.

Here’s the original unaltered photo of Astrid in her tunnel. As you can see she isn’t angry but deep in thought. She is imagining herself teleporting to Georgia to visit her boyfriend Sampy (Kitty Cat Chronicles). The photo above represents that “trip!”

We are participating in Athena and Marie’s Caturday Art Blog Hop. To see the other submissions or add some art of your own, click on the badge to the left.

CATWORKS Giveaway

For an opportunity to win this adorable original painting by Kevin Harwood, please visit the post, CATWORKS by Kevin Harwood with Giveaway, and leave a comment prior to Monday, November 13 at 5 p.m. EST. The painting is 9 1/2 x 12 inches and is valued at $20.00.

In addition to providing this painting for the giveaway, Kevin is offering a 10 percent discount in his Etsy Shop through December 31. Use the code CATZ10 at check-out.

If you see a CATWORKS piece you really love but wish the cat looked more like your own, Kevin can do a custom version inspired by the look and coloring of your cat. Send an email to dallywaters1@mac.com with a photo of your cat. For an additional $5 [total of $25 prior to the 10 percent discount and Free Shipping] Kevin will be happy to create an original work.

Sunday Selfies Blog Hop

We will be having our blog hop tomorrow and invite critters and humans alike to join us. You can add your selfie anytime Sunday after 12:01 a.m. EST. If you would like to get the code and display the entries on your blog, please link to The Cat on My Head and/or display our badge. Thanks! Remember, you will still have the entire day to kick back and enjoy your Easy. That’s what we’ll be doing.

November 8, 2014 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Art Blog Hop 30

SUNPUDDLE SATURDAY WITH ASTRID

Caturday Art Blog Hop

Living in a house that is over one hundred years’ old does not provide us with many sunpuddles. Most sunpuddles occur in the kitchen where the humans had large windows installed when they renovated. With a southern exposure and autumn stripping the leaves from nearby trees, the sunpuddles can be plentiful on a clear day.

While my housemates are outside on the front porch or watching the birds and squirrels from the Catio, I have all the sunpuddles to myself.

After a busy afternoon of performing my duty as self-appointed fly catcher, I sprawled out and luxuriated in this sunpuddle before settling in for a snooze.

As I am a stunning tortie girl and the shadows in the original photo are already blotting out some of my fabulous furs and one eye, I didn’t allow Mom to fuss and fiddle too much. Those of you who regularly follow us know that Mom will continue to tinker and manipulate our Caturday Art photos until she’s used nearly every photo program and filter available. I demanded that she stick with our usual photo editing program, Picasa, and only allowed her to “warmify” my photo and add the “pixelate” filter (with large rectangles so as not to obliterate my loveliness) and the frame.

I am dedicating this Saturday Sunpuddle Caturday Art to my sweet Sampy at Kitty Cat Chronicles and sending him a proliferation of kisses.

We are participating in Athena and Marie’s Caturday Art Blog Hop. You can click on the badge at the left to visit and add your own Caturday Art.

Book Winner

Concatulations to Mom Ellen and the gang at 15 and Meowing. They were the winners of the book, A Cat With Three Tales by Karen Rieser. We hope they enjoy it!

Reminders

Mom asked me to to tell you about the super colossal giveaway we are having for five copies Kate Funk’s book, The Best Cat Book Ever with AC the Cat. Plus, there will be 50 postcard booklets given away. You almost can be guaranteed to win something if you leave a comment. Click here to do so.

Tomorrow is the day y’all wait for so you can show off your selfies. We invite all our furiends to join us for Sunday Selfies. If you haven’t done so yet, what are you waiting for? It is super fun.

So I guess that’s it! Hope y’all have a snoozy, sunpuddle Saturday.

Purrs & paw-pats, Astrid

October 25, 2014 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Art Blog Hop Giveaway Kitty Written Blog 30

SUNDAY SELFIES SURPRISE!

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A few days ago I was looking through the photos on my iPhone to see if I had taken anything I could use on the blog. I discovered that unbeknownst to me Astrid had taken 26 selfies of herself. I had no idea she was so capable; though, I should have. She is a tortie cat after all.

The photos are of varying quality, but over all I am quite impressed. I am sharing three of 26, two exceptionally good ones and one of the less than perfect but still adorable photos.

Astrid whispered in my ear as I was writing this post that she took all these photos for Sampy (Kitty Cat Chronicles) with the hope I would find and share them. She really hopes that he likes them and is sending him a bazillioncajillionqaudruplemillion kisses.

Please join us for our Sunday Selfies Blog Hop and add the code to your blog if you like. I just ask that you include our badge or a link to our blog if you decide to do this.

If you have not left a comment on Mauricio’s and Misty May’s Birthday post for a chance to win a customized decal from Pookapet or a donation to your favorite 501(c)(3) shelter or rescue, you have until noon EDT today to do so. Winners will be announced on Tuesday.

Tomorrow for Man-Cat Monday, Mauricio will share the highlights of his surprise birthday party at Cat Scouts.

September 20, 2014 by Janet Blue Asrid & Sampson Astrid Photo Experiment Birthday Cat Scouts Giveaway Sunday Selfies 50

CATURDAY ART WITH ASTRID

I am featuring Astrid today for our Caturday Art submission so I can give an update on her. But first, here’s her arty photo.

I liked the original of this photo as Astrid was sitting on the colorful kitty pillow, and the photo had lots of various textures. I used my normal editing program, Picasa. I applied the pencil sketch filter and then applied saturation at 100 percent. That made her purple name tag really pop. It also made all the colors appear so much warmer.

Here is the original photo. I always think Astrid is a great candidate for the Caturday Art experiments as her tortie furs can be altered in so many different ways.

As I have been reporting, ever since Astrid and Sampson (Kitty Cat Chronicles) became a couple, she has slowly been emerging from her scaredy-cat persona. She has spent as many as six hours lounging out on the catio napping and watching the birds and squirrels. Click here to see her up close and personal with a squirrel if you missed last week’s Caturday Art post.

She has been coming upstairs to the bedroom. I found her asleep on Mauricio’s blanket from his girlfriend, Allie (Friends Furever), when we returned from biking a few days ago. She remained there for most of the afternoon.

This morning, she came to the bedroom to let me know she wanted breakfast. But the best display of her newly found bravado occurred a few mornings ago when I woke up to her purring and burrowing under the covers next to me. My heart leapt to think that she felt confidant enough to join us in bed.

And tonight, she joined in a play session with six of her fursibs. I will tell you more about that in our Monday Meowsings post when I recap Calista Jo’s birthday celebration. But until then, Calista says, “Thank you for attending my Hello-Kitty-Palooza Birthday Pawty. I had a blast!”

For those who requested Hello Kitty memento photos, I have completed several. If you did not receive yours today, I will have it to you tomorrow.

We are participating in the Caturday Art Blog Hop held by Athena and Marie. To join or view the other submissions, please click on the badge at the left.

June 20, 2014 by Janet Blue Asrid & Sampson Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Art Blog Hop 32

CATURDAY ART BLOG HOP/SATURDAY PHOTO HUNTERS: RIPPLE

Athena, Cat Goddess is trying to establish a new series entitled, Caturday Art Blog Hop. This will be her second posting, and we will be joining in this week.

But, of course, this is also the day for Saturday Photo Hunters, in which we occasionally like to pawticipate. Today’s theme is ripple. As it happens, we have some photos that will work for both of these themes so decided to do both today.

We shared a photo with you last August on a Wordless Wednesday. It was supposed to be part of a series entitled, Astrid Photo Experiment, but we have not shared another until now. So without further ado, here is Astrid Photo Experiment #2: Ripples.

If you are wondering where the ripples come in, we believe her furs, especially her tail furs look as if they are rippling.

We are all feeling a little miffed that Astrid is featured in two consecutive posts, but we’ll figure out some way to get back at her.

Have a terrific weekend.

Purrs and hugs, Lily Olivia, Misty May, Mauricio, Giulietta, Fiona, Astrid, Lisbeth and Calista Jo

January 18, 2014 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Caturday Caturday Art Blog Hop Kitty Written Blog Saturday Photo Hunters 23

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY: ASTRID PHOTO EXPERIMENT #1

August 27, 2013 by Janet Blue Astrid Photo Experiment Wordless Wednesday 44

YOU
For Fiona

It seems like only yesterday…
You were just a kitten.
When I saw your pleading look,
I was completely smitten.

Now at only six years old,
You are getting ready to leave,
Soon you will have your wings.
I’ve already started to grieve.

You’ve fought hard for the past year,
And I’m not ready to say good-bye.
I can’t imagine you not in my life
I am so sad…today I had to cry.

I am grateful and blessed
For my six years with you.
You’ll live in my heart forever.
You’re one of the best ever Kitties Blue.

YESTERDAY

Many yesterdays have passed since
You gained your angel wings. Today
Is six months since you left us behind
To remember and mourn. Our hearts
Continue to hurt, and we miss
You as much as the day you left.
Giulietta whined from the catio
Yesterday as I worked in the yard.
I know you put her up to it. That
Was your way of getting me to,
Allow you to join me as I
Gardened. You were there with me
In spirit. With every meow
I thought of you and how much I miss
Your sweet face and disposition.
In these past few months, many friends
Have traveled your same path in your
paw-steps. I am certain you were
Waiting to greet them with purrs and hugs.
I pray you and your friends are laughing,
Frolicking and having fun together.
Picturing that makes me smile, but
Does not lessen my sadness at your
No longer being here to snuggle
And receive our love, care and kisses.
Fiona, please do not ever forget
You are still and always will be loved.

ONE YEAR MISSING YOU

One year has passed since you flew away,
And I still think of you everyday.
I see your sweet face in my mind’s eye
And wish we’d never had to say good-bye.
It’s nice you’ve sent us kitties needing a family,
But my dearest love, we are now at capacity.
You thought it would take more than one cat
To take your place in our habitat.
We love Cooper Murphy and baby Sawyer dearly
But thinking either could replace you makes me teary.
You were one-of-a-kind and will stay in my heart
Until the day I join you and we’re no longer apart.
When once again I can hold you in my arms
And revel in all your love and feline charms.
Together with you and all who have passed.
I will spend eternity contemplating how blessed
I was to share my life with my furry children,
Each and every one of you one-in-a billion.

UNTIL

I miss you each day.
Until we meet in heaven,
The pain will remain.

ONE OF A KIND

I don’t know how to say good-bye.
I thought you were invincible; though,
You used up many of your nine lives.
You ruled us all with an iron paw;
Never took “no” for an answer
And always got your way.
If not, you’d bark to signal your
Displeasure and sometimes raise a paw.
I always joked that you were bi-polar.
When I told people you were a calico
They immediately understood what I meant.
Today was unnaturally quiet in the house.
Can a home seem empty with eight cats?
I will miss waking up at night to find you
Sitting next to me and staring at me.
I will miss you yelling at us as you did
When you wanted breakfast and dinner.
I will miss watching you lounging and snoozing
On the porch settee on a warm afternoon.
But most of all I will miss your kisses!
When kitten Sawyer befriended you,
We suspect you were imparting your
Wisdom and secrets for controlling us.
Time will tell if he was a good listener.
But whatever he may have learned,
Neither Sawyer nor any other cat
Can or will replace you in our hearts.
Lily Olivia, you were one-of-a-kind.