Monday, December 30, 2019

An Early New Year Greeting!!

Because we are sooo behind on email (sitting here today reading email from as far back as the 21st!!) we missed this darling card from our dear furiends Pipo, Dalton and Benji


Isn't it beautiful? While it might be too late for Christmas, THANKFULLY they added Happy New Year so let's consider this our first greeting for the New Year to all of you from us and Pipo, Dalton & Benji!!!!  We love this dear furmily so much!!!  Please forgive us for not seeing this sooner!!!!

Friday, December 27, 2019

Friday Fun: 5th Annual Bloggers Meowy Catmas Show by Peaches, Paprika and Mom Carol

Cody, Dakota and I were elated when we read a Facebook post we were tagged in and saw that we were a part of the  5th Annual Bloggers Meowy Catmas Show that was made by Peaches, Paprika and their Mom, Carol. To visit their blog click here

I am pretty certain we participated every year (we might have missed one year along the way), and this year we were sad because we saw the notice on Facebook to send our cards when it was too late for us to do so (or....I might have been too busy and pre-occupied to do it)

So, when I saw the Facebook post that we WERE included after all, I was deeply touched!

This slideshow is always so much fun and Carol puts so much work into it. Please check it out below if you haven't already seen it:







Thursday, December 26, 2019

Thankful Thursday:Unboxing Secret Paws Gifts (Boxing Day and National Thank You Note Day)


Hi my furiends!! It's Cody pawing out the blog today! Well the long wait is OVER!!!! Today is the day that I am going to reveal the most pawesome gifts that I received from the incredibly STUNNING (and brilliant and kind), Cathy Keisha and TW (who we call "Mom").

Mom, Dakota and I opened our gifts on Christmas (oh yes we did!) because I thought it was appropriate to blog about it on Thursday, which happens to be Boxing Day and National Thank You Note Day! (Technically a hand-written note should be written, but we think a blog post is equally as good in this case!) It's the purrfect day to express our immense gratitude!

Ok my furiends, sit back and relax while I show you all of the goodies!

As you know, when the box arrived we all were so excited!

CK and TW had some lovely cards that I was excited to read:


But I just couldn't control my excitement and I wanted to see what was in that box!


When I peeked inside I found a beautiful kitty bag


Inside that adorable bag were wonderfully wrapped presents!!


Ok so I opened a few before Mom took the photo! Give me a break, I was excited!


CK has known me for my entire ten years of blogging, (she has been blogging ten years too and if you aren't familiar with her blog it is named after HER! It is Stunning Keisha and you MUST visit!) CK is a kitty with a lot of street smarts and general life smarts. She is insightful and she writes quite well. Her intelligence  just shines through her blog posts and she would never admit it, but she is also a sensitive kitty. Caring too. I knew since CK has known me so long, she would pick out gifts that would make me purr! She most definitely made me purr!


There were some little toys that I could swat around, a few of them were from the fabulous Catlady Box, and one of them had "World's Cutest Kitty" printed on it. Yep, that would be ME!!!

There was also a cool Tipsy Nip Pickle (I had one many years ago but could no longer find it, so I was thrilled to get another one!) but I think my FAVORITE gift of all came from Meowijuana!!! It was their Catnip Spliff with catnip and valerian root and I went NUTS when Mom let me open it!!! You can see in the short video below:

When it comes to Meowijuana I don't mess around, that's for sure!!! Mom said she was so happy because I don't play as much as I used to, and when she opened that toy I played like a kitten! In fact, all of that playing gave me the munchies. Thankfully CK had me covered!!! She had gotten me Party Mix too! (That CK thought of EVERYTHING!! But then again, that's how she rolls!!)




 I had so many fun toys and I am so grateful!!

After all of that playing and eating it dawned on me that I hadn't opened EVERYTHING yet! I went back to scope out the box



Sure enough, I had missed two presents! There was one for Mom and one for Dakota too! Wait til you see what Mom got! OMC!!


That is NOT a rug but it is quite large! You know what that is? It's a GORGEOUS  scarf from Cat Lady Box!!!! Mom nearly died! She LOVES IT!! The photos don't do it justice, it's even prettier in pawson!


The colors are just beautiful, it is like artwork on a scarf!!!! Mom is just so excited and practically cried when she opened it. Mom thought it was sooo thoughtful of CK and TW to give her such a beautiful scarf. She is crazy about it!

Speaking of thoughtful, there was even an adorably wrapped present for Dakota!!!


Dakota kept staring at it because he couldn't believe that he was lucky enough to receive a gift!! Many of you know Dakota is getting up there (Mom says "God-willing he will be 13 on February 28th, I will be 13 April 1st, but for kitties it's not usually as bad as it can be for a 13 year old woofie), and he is having some issues. He doesn't hear as well as he used to, he doesn't play like he used to and doesn't even smile as much as he used to. He is still having some blood pressure issues but Mom is convinced (because they fluctuate so much), that it is white coat syndrome, (we truly think so!). Anyway, things have been tense with his issues, and everyone has been worried, so we are so grateful and happy that CK and TW thought of Dakota too. Boy oh boy, CK and TW said they had never bought a dog a gift before, but wow did they ever pick a good one!


It's the cutest stuffed Beaver from a place we never knew existed. It is from AKC Select (we know AKC obviously, but we never knew there was a line of toys! Leave it to a smart kitty like CK to figure that one out!) It is so cute and it squeaks!




It is just the cutest!!! Mom tried to get some good pictures but Dakota has a tendency of taking off the second he senses Mom wants to take photos of him.  A super cool thing that happened was a few hours after Mom took photos, Dakota went over to the beaver on his own and started running around the room with it. That made Mom and Dad soooo happy! CK and TW Dakota LOVES IT! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!

So there you go my furiends! Mom, Dakota and I cannot thank CK and TW enough for their incredibly thoughtful and generous gifts!!! They are just the best! Taking part in Secret Paws is ALWAYS fun, but it is extra fun when your Secret Paws is a kitty and human that you have been furiends with for 10 years and have admired just as long. CK is one of my first blogging furiends and it just made this extra, extra special. They touched my furry heart and Mom is just over the moon! Dakota too!

Love you CK and TW!!!!!!!! Thanks for making us so happy!!!









And...of course we just have to pawticipate in the Brian's Home Thankful Thursday Blog Hop we are beyond thankful so how could we NOT?


Wednesday, December 25, 2019

Meowy Christmas One and All!

Hi my furiends and MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!


I wanted to take a moment to THANK EVERYONE for the snail mail cards that I received:


Considering my lazy Mom never added us to the card list this year we are flattered that ANYONE took the time to think of us, THANK YOU!!!

Now on to the ecards that we received! (In previous years we linked to everyone's blogs, this year because I don't know how to Mom is lazy, we aren't going to. Please accept our apologies!) Now, bring on the cards!!















These are just the best ever, aren't they? Thank you so much dear furiends for thinking of us even if we aren't blogging nearly as much as we used to. It truly means the world to us!!!

Hoping Santa is extra good to ALL OF YOU!!!

Oh and we apologize that we didn't post about our Secret Paws gifts yet, but come on over on THURSDAY, we are going to post them for sure!!

Meowy Christmas to one and all and Happy Chanukah to those who celebrate! We love you!

Cody and Mom (and Dakota too!)




Friday, December 20, 2019

Our Holiday Card...and...We Know Who Our Secret Paws is!!!

Hi everyone!!! We are doing our best to send cards via email/snail mail to every furry/human who has sent us one, but in the event we didn't reach everyone we wanted to post our card here for you to grab:


It is always fun when Chanukah and Christmas fall together so we dusted off our card from the last time this happened and figured since we like it are lazy we would use it again!

And......guess what? We know who our Secret Paws is!!! We were full of glee when the mail person dropped off our package today! It is from none other than:




The most STUNNING Cathy Keisha and TW!!!! CK and TW have been blogging as long as we have been (slightly over 10 years now), and they were two of our FIRST blogging furiends that we made!
I am waiting to have the boys (yep I said boys! CK and TW were BEYOND THOUGHTFUL and even included a gift for Dakota!) open their gifts Sunday night, which is the first night of Chanukah! We are hoping to do a blog post on the 23rd showing what we received. We are all so excited! In the unlikely event that you don't know CK and TW you can visit their blog Stunning Keisha by clicking on their name.

Thank you sooo much CK and TW! We will be thanking you again and again! We love you!

To all of you, we love you too and hope you enjoy our card!

Monday, December 16, 2019

The Secret Paws Gifts from Cody and I

Hi All! Well, since we didn't get our invite to post on the Secret Paws blog,  we just decided to post here. We sent our packages out I believe the Monday after Thanksgiving (yep for us that's unheard of!)



Also,  those of you who have received gifts from us in the past know that we normally order from places that will wrap for us, (yeah, we can be lazy sometimes lol), BUT NOT THIS YEAR! NOPE! We wrapped our gifts, each and every one of them! (I should say, I wrapped them, Cody didn't feel like helping AT ALL this year MOL).

We hadn't heard from our recipient letting us know they received their package (and they don't blog regularly), soooooo...thankfully last week I went to their Facebook page and asked them. I didn't blow the surprise because the Mom had opened our card and saw it was from us, but they are waiting til Christmas (I think), to open their gifts which is great. Cody and I are just happy/relieved they arrived and weren't stolen by some kitty pirate package snatchers. When we didn't receive an email telling us they arrived we were quite concerned.

Hoping they like their gifts!

Monday, December 9, 2019

Catnapstories: The Adventures of Vince the Cat, A Beautifully Illustrated and Educational Trilogy by Heidi Bryant

Having traveled extensively throughout her life, author Heidi Bryant decided to combine her love of cats, her passion for languages and travel into storytelling. The result? A beautiful, fun and educational trilogy, Catnapstories, that star a darling gray kitty named Vince and are named The Adventures of Vince the Cat.


Go along with Vince (and some other kitties and humans) as they explore the world! You will also learn in the first book how Vince came to live with Heidi (yes, the author is a character in the series!)

The first stop is Paris, and as you would guess, the first book in the series is Vince Goes to Paris. Among many interesting things in this book  is there are actual sentences spoken in the language of the country being featured in the book. The book isn't entirely written in French, but there ARE full sentences printed in French with translations. You will also find words/definitions of French words used in the back of the book. 


See the gray kitty in the picture? That is Vince, in my opinion he shares a striking resemblance to my Cody! I bet Cody would have LOVED to join Vince on his travels. Imagine all that he would have learned! Please take a moment and watch this short videos that follow each book title  and see for yourself how charming the entire series is!




The second stop is India, 
Vince Discovers the Golden Triangle. 

"This story takes you on a journey to one of the most incredible places in the world; India. 

A vast, beautiful, culturally diverse and ancient land. 

In this adventure Vince visits some of the most famous and beautiful sites. Sampling the local cuisine and meeting endangered animals. He experiences an amazing and colourful Hindu festival, plays elephant polo, and eventually discovers the Golden Triangle."



The third (and we bet not the final stop) is Seville!

Vince Discovers the Wonder of Seville


"This story immerses you into Spanish culture and Castellano - the official language of Spain. 


Set in springtime in the beautiful and historic city of Seville in Andalusia, Spain. Heidi, Vince and Adele rescue a beautiful little kitten from a precarious situation, visit the Plaza de Toros, meet some wonderful new friends and learn to dance flamenco as well as experience many other delights in this wonderful city."



Author Heidi Bryant lives in London and to say she is well-traveled is an understatement! She speaks French, German and Spanish. In 2018 she started learning Italian! What deeply touched me was that Heidi had the idea to write The Adventures of Vince the Cat when she lost her beloved cat Mikki to old age the summer of 2018. As you would expect, Heidi was devastated and in order to keep the memories of Mikki and her other beautiful cats  that she had past and present in the forefront, she decided to write the stories with the cats as the main characters. There is an enormous amount of love that comes through the pages of each book. The love encompasses the countries/cultures being featured, as well as for the cats in the stories.

Heidi hopes that children will love reading these stories many times! She hopes to educate children about other cultures, languages and customs in different countries. The stories are geared for children ages 4 to 11 but in my opinion I would say they are better suited to children ages 7 to 11.



I  LOVE that these books are just slightly larger than the length and width of my entire hand...and are approx 50 something pages each. The size of the books is endearing to me and I think that children will enjoy holding them because the size makes them easy to transport, plus the size is unique.

These "beautifully illustrated stories to inspire the next generation" are sure to inspire the little ones in your life. These would be a marvelous addition to your holiday gift purchases for the younger set. Have no little ones? Gift a neighbor's child, doctor's office, school library, the elementary teachers in your life and more with this lovely trilogy. After all, it is the "season of giving" and how much fun would it be to "pay it forward" especially if you do NOT have children? I am going to gift my series to a special elementary school teacher that I know for her fifth graders.

You can also find Vince on Facebook and Instagram

Oh and because this is a TRILOGY, Cody and I give this 12 kitty paws up!!!

Ok, so there are five paws there, but you get the idea!

In full disclosure: we were sent the trilogy in exchange for our always honest review. We were not monetarily compensated for this review. A special THANK YOU for being so kind as to ship the entire trilogy across the pond....and...in RECORD TIME!!! Lots of love from Cody and I!