Wordless Wednesday
Nipheads
SUMMER FUN FRIENDLY FILL-INS
Friendly Fill-Ins: Week #56
It is time again to let you know a little more about ourselves. Kitties Blue did not complete any of the fill-ins this week. The kitties did not find them to be feline friendly. As per usual, my completions are in teal italics.
1. A law I would like to see passed is the Pet and Women Safety Act, or PAWS Act (H.R. 909) and (S. 322) reintroduced in February 2017 by U.S. House of Representative Katherine Clark (D-MA) and U.S. Senators Dean Heller (R-NV) and Gary Peters (D-MI). This bipartisan legislation protects victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking and dating violence from emotional and psychological trauma caused by violence against their pets. (Click here, if you are in the United States, to submit the form to ask members of your local legislature to help protect domestic violence survivors and their pets.)
2. My favorite card game is canasta; though, I haven’t played since I left home to go to college. My grandparents taught me to play when I was still too young to hold the cards. My second would be cribbage, which I play with the kitties’ dad, Tom, usually when we are on vacation.
Mom can play cards. We prefer nippy games.
3. With Summer unofficially here, we will be doing more swimming and bike riding.
4. A favourite Summer memory is from when I was 16. I toured several countries in Europe and then attended classes at the American College in Paris as part of a program entitled, American Pre-College Program in Paris.
Friends, Ellen (15AndMeowing) and Annie (McGuffy’s Reader), are the hosts and authors of the Fill-Ins each week. This is a blog hop, which you can enter by clicking on the badge below, which will take you to Annie’s blog.
TUESDAY NEWS DAY WITH NIPHEADS
Recommendation for The Cat on My Head
I was delightfully surprised when I was contacted by the Best for The Kids web-site representative and asked if they could include our blog on their list of the 16 best cat blogs for kids. The Kitties Blue and I have always considered The Cat on My Head a family-friendly blog, with the occasional PG rating when Mauricio talks about being bitten on his bum. Regardless we are honored to be selected for this list.
This is from the Best for the Kids site:
An overwhelming majority of kids absolutely ADORE pets. A large portion of those kids love nothing more than a cute, fluffy cat. Here at BestForTheKids, we cover the importance of pets in the life of kids and how pets help kids become compassionate human beings.
It took us more than 3 weeks to come up with this list of carefully vetted cat blogs that had to go through several filters before being considered useful for parents who’d like to know about cats mainly because their kids love them.
The Best for the Kids mission really appeals to me, and Kitties Blue and I thank them for thinking our blog worthy of their list. You’ll find several other blogs, with which you are familiar, on their list as well. Click on the link above to find the complete list.
Now for the Nipheads
Kitties Blue favorite person was here yesterday—Chris. She’ll be here in just a couple of days to care for them while Dad Tom and I are at the BlogPaws Conference. She was here yesterday to clean. And she never comes empty handed. Chris always brings treats or catnip. The minute the gang realizes she’s here, they begin circling like starving sharks. Yesterday the offering was nip. Chris covers the foyer rug, and the gang goes crazy…rolling, sniffing and nomming nip! They always have a few hours to get their fill before Chris vacuums it up.
When nip is involved, Astrid and Lisbeth actually get along. At one point they were even touching.
If you think this looks like the gang is being spoiled, it is just a prelude to what they can expect while Dad Tom and I are away. They’ll even get their catio time, but no outside for Lily Olivia, Misty May or Mauricio. Of course, Mau is already on house arrest. He’s not happy about it and continues to complain, but he’s healing. That is what’s important.
Wishing you all a day filled with nip dreams. Hope to see you right back here tomorrow.
LISBETH IN LIVING COLOR
Caturday Art
Lisbeth claims she has not been getting enough face time on the blog, which is probably true. As I have written before, she is not the most sociable cat. But she is gorgeous and should have her fair share of blog time, especially as I know her boyfriend, Cat Scout Charles, enjoys seeing her.
To create Lisbeth’s arty photo, I used a custom filter in Dreamscope. Then I used the Boost feature in Picasa and added the borders using Picasa.
Lisbeth is standing in front and to the right of the catmint plant. The photo taken was shortly after we bought the plant. Lisbeth had been browsing shortly before that. You can see that photo here. The plant was big then (just over three weeks ago), but now it is HUGE as you can see in this photo. It will soon be time to harvest.
This is our submission in this week’s Caturday Art Blog Hop hosted by the lovely Athena Cat Goddess Wise Kitty. To enter some art of your own in the hop and/or view the other submissions, click on the link.
Sunday Selfies
Tomorrow is the day we all look forward to…Sunday, when we can take it easy. But we always post a selfie on our blog hop and look forward to all our friends doing the same. We will have a guest host tomorrow. You may have seen this critter previously, but you’ll need to return tomorrow to see who it is. We certainly appreciate everyone who enters each week. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.
HAPPY HEARTS AT HOME
Thursday has now become poem day for us so we can pawticipate in our friend Sammy’s (onespoliedcat) Thoroughly Poetic Thursday. The suggested featured letter for this week’s poem is H. So many pawsitive words begin with H, which make this a challenge one that Here’s our poem for the week
Happy Hearts at Home
H is the letter for this week’s poem,
And there’s no better H word than Home.
Home is where the Heart is, and we like that,
As Heart is just another word for cat!
We could use Healthy or Happy as well,
Because both those words are pretty swell.
Some H words are a definite “miss,”
Like Hungry, Hot, Hairball and Hiss.
Hope and Hand are also pretty great,
While we don’t like the H word Hate.
Hibernation is a good H word when winter comes along
Especially as it means the groundHogs will be gone.
But as we come to the end of this poem,
Kitties Blue are always Happy Hearts at Home.
A Wordless Wednesday Update
It would seem as if Lisbeth did a bit more than browsing the catnip plant yesterday. We saw her later in the day lounging on the catio cat tower, and this is what she looked like.
As our post title yesterday indicated, this is a new nip plant. In fact it is one of two new nip plants. The ones Mom planted earlier in the summer did not survive. They were thriving one day, and the next they were D-E-A-D! Mom’s a bit afraid for the future of these as they were so root bound she couldn’t even break them apart with a shovel. She intends to watch them closely and if they start to show any signs of failing, she will immediately harvest all that nommy nip. (If you missed yesterday’s nippy post, click on the link below.)
Purrs and paw-pats, Lily Olivia, Mauricio, Misty May, Giulietta, Fiona, Astrid, Lisbeth and Calista Jo
FILL-INS, A POEM & CATNIP
This is week number eight for the Friendly Friday Fill-Ins hosted by Ellen (15 and Meowing) and Annie (McGuffy’s Reader). This is a blog hop. You can enter your link on Annie’s blog.
My fill-ins are in teal italics.
1. I never thought I would miss writing and sending snail-mail letters, but I do.
2. Every 4th of July we watch the fireworks from our upper deck while the kitties stay inside.
3. If I knew blogging about the kitties would become my passion, I would have started long before 2012.
4. I have trouble with my attention span and completing one project prior to moving on to another.
Phooey, we missed writing a poem yesterday for Sammy’s Thoroughly Poetic Thursday. It’s week number three and the letter of the day was “C. As Calista Jo wrote our Thursday post and mentioned Catnip, I imagine this is what she would have written.
Catnip Crazies by Calista Jo
Catnip is fine.
Catnip is good.
It gives me a buzz
Under my hood.
I love to sniff it
And roll in it all day,
But eating it is what
Makes me want to play.
I get frisky and crazy
And bounce all around,
Until I fall over
And collapse in a mound.
C.J. may have written the poem, but Lily Olivia is sharing her post roll-in-the-nip photo.
KITTIES, GUARD YOUR NIP!
Do your catnip plants look like this?
Or do they look like this?
If your nip looks like the sad little plant above, you may have a nip-addicted cat at your house. Or you may have a human nip thief. This is a most serious situation. Why in the world would your humans be pilfering your nip? Did you know that catnip has uses other than turning you into a crazypants?
One of those uses can come in very handy this time of year. With summer just around the corner, insects will be on the increase, especially those dastardly mosquitos. Those little blood-sucking creatures have been in the news more than usual lately. Humans are talking and worrying about the mosquitos that spread the Zika virus finding their way into the U.S.
But what in the heck does that have to do with your beloved catnip?
Here’s a little history: Humans have a long tradition of planting catnip near a house or barn to repel mice and rats and to keep insects away. Research has shown that cockroaches and termites are repelled by catnip. And nip has been used where cats sleep to help keep fleas away.
Napeta cataria (catnip) has been shown to be 96 percent effective as a repellent of flies and mosquitos. The U.S. National Library of Medicine of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has reported that tests have found nip to be as effective as DEET. And recent research done at Iowa State Univerty showed catnip is ten times more effective at repelling mosquitoes than DEET.
So what is this DEET stuff?
N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide, also called DEET (/diːt/) or diethyltoluamide, is the most common active ingredient in insect repellents. It is a slightly yellow oil intended to be applied to the skin or clothing. It provides protection against mosquitoes, ticks, fleas, chiggers, leeches and many biting insects. However, a 2013 study suggests that mosquitoes can at least temporarily overcome or adapt to the repellent effect of DEET after an initial exposure.
A little stealth on your part should help you keep an eye on both your humans and your plants. If you see your humans ravaging your nip, they may be planning on making their own mosquito repellent by boiling the stems, flowers and leaves in a pot of water. They will allow the water and plant mixture to steep until cool. The nip water will be put in a spray bottle and applied as needed.
If you don’t catch your humans in the act of thievery, you can test them to see if they have been pilfering your plants. Give them a sniff to see if they smell like your favorite plant. If so, you might want to encourage them to remove all standing water from your property and add some mosquito-repelling plants to your yard, such as marigolds, bee balm, citronella, lavender and lemongrass.
Good luck on preserving your catnip for your own personal use. If necessary, you can always hold it for ransom. It should be worth several thousand treats at least.
Purrs and paw-pats, Lily Olivia, Mauricio, Misty May, Giulietta, Fiona, Astrid, Lisbeth and Calista Jo aka Nipheads
CARDWOOD DERBY TIME AT CAT SCOUTS
Second Cat Scouts’ Cardwood Derby
Mau has entered the second, sort-of-annual Cat Scouts’ Cardwood Derby, and he needs your votes to win this super cool trophy. It would have his name and not Scout Banzai should he win.
As Mauricio is Director of Campus Security at Cat Scouts University he thought it would be nice to have an official campus vehicle. Here are a few photos of Mau, his car and his pit crew. We’ll tell you how to vote at the end of this post.
The back of Mau’s official CSU Security vehicle.
(c) The Cat on My Head 2016
Lisbeth served on Mau’s pit crew for the second time.
(c) The Cat on My Head 2016
Mau’s pit crew, Calista Jo and Lisbeth, were stoned on catnip and acting like hooligans. (The arrows point to the nip.)
(c) The Cat on My Head 2016
Mau jumping from his vehicle to apprehend his hooligan sisters.
(c) The Cat on My Head 2016
Mau with pit crew, Lisbeth, in his first cardwood derby entry.
(c) The Cat on My Head 20
I am pretty happy with my improved design and construction skills in comparison to Mau’s last derby car. If you weren’t following us then, here’s a photo. It was more elaborate, but the craftsmanship was definitely lacking.
Though Mau’s car is better constructed this year, I fear he has no chance of taking home that trophy. The competition is really tough. Scouts were able to create any type of vehicle they wanted, and some are more imaginative than his. There’s a hot air balloon, a food truck and a stagecoach to name a few of the unique entries.
If you would like to vote for Mauricio, you can do so on the Cat Scouts Organization page on Facebook. He has two photos. Scroll down until you find them and then “LIKE” them. You have through January 22 to cast your vote. While you are there check out all the entries. They really are creative.
Mau says, “Please drive safely and never while stoned on catnip!”
