Time to Top the Tree

Merry Christmas 

Whether you view Christmas as a day of prayer and meditation, a day to bask in family or a day to open presents, eat too much and watch football, have a safe and happy day.  

Now, for the unveiling of the tree-topper 

(Note: scroll down to the previous post for the description of the tree)

It's a porcelain headed kitty angel  in a flowing pink gown that sparkles and twinkles in time to the music emanating from her mouth. Her wings are made of peacock feathers.  She is holding beautiful strands of yarn and ribbon, each tied to a catnip mousy, furry mice, and origami mice.  Also attached to the ribbons are streaming  toilet paper rolls and tissue paper flowers.  Treats are tied in the middle of the strands, potato chips (sour cream and onion, per request), hickory sticks, yummy litlle dried fishys and shrimp, wee cans of tuna and duck.  

And for the crowning touch

Resting on her head

Like a golden crown

A perfect golden brown

ROASTED CHICKEN

Happy holidays to all, and special thanks to the kitties of the L&L yahoo group for their help in putting up our dream tree.

  the kitties: Amber, Bubba, Chi, Dora, Gabby, Jet,  Kiki, Onyx, Salem and Squirrel

 the dogs: Chico, Joey and Jasper

and the people: Chuck and Mary

What does a cat want in a Christmas tree?

"A decorated super scratching post with lounging limbs! Yep, a true cat's
Christmas tree."
Mary Ruth

I asked all the cats at our house, and after much discussion, they finally came back to me with a concordance.
The trunk must be thick and scratchable, with no low hanging branches to get in
the way of a good stretch. The branches themselves must be horizontal, sturdy
and wide enough as well as far enough apart for a good nap. Bubba wants some
stringy or feathery things, because I told him no plastic bags. The rest is up
to me, but I must bear in mind that accidents do happen, especially to fragile
ornaments, easily damaged crochet or toothsome goodies. 
Other suggestions, typed by human housemates of cats on a group I belong to:
 
Mary Ruth's cats Tigger, Frisky, Alice, and Mandiwant a feather on a wand toy stuck in the tree along with some sprigs of
fresh catnip,  bubble lights they can stare at, lots of feathers,  strands of cat treats, wrapping paper/boxes/bags to romp in. and beautiful, glitzy, pattable, swinging ornaments.
Tigger especially wants a  passle of "paper mouse" crumpled sheets of paper under the tree to play soccer with and talk to with his signature double meow(One of Mary Ruth's previous housemates, Scamper, would probably opt out of having a tree, after a particularly terrible Chritmas where the tree attacked him)

Lynn's cats:

Toby would want his tree covered in string. The longer the string the better. (editor:  yes, I will remind him of the danger of string, but it is his fantasy tree)

Bonnie would want her tree covered in food, food and more food, any color, shape, size food.and she would only be able to decorate the very bottom boughs as she is too heavy to climb the tree to do it justice.

Her Amelia would like balls, preferably noisy balls made from tissue paper so she can knock them off the tree and chase them. She wouldn't know what to do with it when she got it but she would have fun in her own way. She will only play with them when the other two cats are not around so that she may  maintain her illusion of dignity.

Barb's cats Sam, Lacy and Candye want a musical tree.  (editor's note: sadly Candye, one of the respondents to the query, has gone to the bridge this week,  she will be sorely missed)
 

Rose's cat  Baxxie would want peacock feathers............an entire tree made of peacock feathers would be choice number one for him.

 

Yolanda's  MagicKat is too much of a lady to tear up a Christmas tree. She would want things of beauty on the upper branches and on the bottom branches lightweight glitzy things that she could just give enough of a pat to watch them swing.

Vickie's cats  both approve of the feather toy.  Cookie would dredge up a small, recently deceased mammal  for our decorative pleasure, and Muffin would insist on a nice dark folded sweat shirt to lay on under the tree so everyone could see the lovely light colored hair he would decorate with.

Christmas Pretties Warning

I had to take one of our big dogs to the vet yesterday for his chronic ear infection.  While there, the vet was telling me about a client who wanted to surprise his wife with a Boston puppy. To be cute, he tied a pretty curly ribbon around the puppy's neck. The pup got the ribbon in his mouth and swallowed most of it. The ribbon caused a blockage and $4000 later, they saved the puppy. This may have been a puppy, but how many times have you seen the cute picture of the kitten with a ribbon around it's neck, or playing with a ribbon? I also want to remind you that besides ribbons, pretty, shiny tinsel is dangerous if swallowed. I love tinsel, but I haven't had it on my trees for many years.

Bubba won a photo contest by showing his heart

Bubba won a photo contest on Thriftyfun!
His full name is Bubba Flowerface and he is a six year old cat. He was born in our closet. His mother was a rescue kitty that showed up one day at our feral colony. He loves to pose for photos and show off his handsomeness. In this picture, he shows off his heart.
Bubba's mother was an Abyssinian or Abyssinian mix, and his sister shows it. We think his father was one of the black and white ferals named Tux. Bubba has a white stripe on his back leg exactly where Tux does, and it also matches the top line of Chi's stocking on her back leg.   It really could be any other cat, though.
His mother showed up in the feral colony we take care of. She was friendly and pregnant, so we brought her in and set up a box in the bottom of the closet for her to have her babies in. She had four: Bubba, tiny Dora the Explorer, Casper and Pollux (twins). The twins were born in the same sack, something I had never seen before, and I have worked with dogs and cats for 30 years.
Bubba loves stick toys, whether they have string, feathers or material strips. He also likes to cuddle and bathe the rescues. Bubba got his name for being Dora's brother, and the Flowerface because as a kitten he was one of those pansy face kittens with a round face and big eyes.
My mom really wanted to show him in the neutered housecat category at cat shows, because she said she had never seen a prettier cat at any of the shows, but she was not able to do this before she died.  He is available to be adopted, and if anyone had the desire to show him, I'm sure they would have great luck, as long as he agreed that he wanted to show.  He also is quite photogenic and loves to pose for the camera.