Cats

Meet Rigel!

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-01-12 19:07

rigel the puma

This is Rigel, Namir’s cousin, a puma.  I was actually planning to put him together first, to practice a new pattern with familiar fabric, but right from the start that presented problems.  So Namir was practice, and Rigel came next once I knew what I was doing.  He’s made of flannel (solid aqua) and quilting cotton (blue dot print and white cloud print).  I gave him big dark eyes and moved his ears up a little after seeing how Namir came out.  He looks like a warm weather cat, like an equator Puma, and Namir looks like an Amur leopard ready for winter, especially when you see them together!

Meet Namir!

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-01-05 19:11

leopard front

Here’s Namir!  He’s a plush leopard and my first attempt at sewing a stuffed animal.  (I used the Funky Friends Factory Larry the Lion pattern, but for some reason I’ve never been a huge lion fan, so I left the mane out and chose a print fabric.)

I’m not entirely happy with the result, but I’m not entirely unhappy either. 

Amigurumi Roly Poly Cat Family

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-12-22 09:50

roly poly cats family

I’m on a quest for cute crocheted cat patterns.  Unfortunately, my definition of cute – when it comes to cats at least – doesn’t seem to match most everyone else’s.  Someday I’ll design my own, but I’m not that experienced with crochet yet. 

In the meantime I did come across Puchitomato’s pattern for a roly poly cat amigurumi and I ran with it.  When I was making the first one (blue, green and yellow), I thought of how neat it would be to have them be the main decoration on a Christmas tree.  Being between the size of a baseball and a softball, it wasn’t quite going to work for our small tree (it would be great near the bottom of a very large tree). 

Feigned Innocence plus catnip toy tips

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-12-15 17:52

The other day Neko was trying to get into the dogs’ dishes.  She’s always trying to sneak their food (she doesn’t care if it’s dry or wet, she just wants it), so we store the dishes under the bottom shelf of the rack near where we feed them while they’re not interested in eating or are outside.  Neko was trying to reach between the wires of the shelf to pull out food.  I always ask her what she’s doing when she does this, but this time she stopped and looked at me, said “meow!” just like she was saying “nothing!” and then went right back to it.  I can’t believe she thought I would believe that.

Something else Neko really goes for is catnip, and I’ve learned a few things about keeping catnip toys interesting:

Where did my cat kick pillow come from?

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-11-10 16:57

As a tiny kitten (and she was particularly tiny), Neko had a cat-shaped toy about half her size.  She loved to beat it up . .Grown-up Neko lying near the tiny cat toy . until the day she kicked herself in the face trying to do so because she’d grown so much.  So when I was trying to think  of things Neko, and possibly other adult cats, might like to play with I remembered that toy.  It needed to be something not too wide so it could be hugged, long enough so the cat’s kicks would land where they were intended, and not be too complicated – if you’ve known any cats you’ve probably noticed that often as soon as something is complicated to make or if you spend more than a certain amount of money on it, they don’t want it.

This Caturday, Meet Neko!

Submitted by ailuros on Sat, 2011-10-01 00:00

Neko is a melanistic tabby, which is a fancy -- and shorter -- way to say she has almost all black fur with stripes that are Neko sleeping on the bed visible in the right light. I sometimes think of her as my little black panther, partly because of the markings, and partly because she sometimes walks just like one of the Pantherine* cat species.

Neko tends to rotate through certain favorite things (places to sleep, toys), but there are some things she always loves. Like food. She's almost as accurate as a clock when it comes to meal time.

She loves to roast in the summer heat in the (screened-in) carport, where she also loves watching -- and when possible, chasing -- the wildlife.

She also loves to run. When she was little she would run more often, but even now she'll tear through the house every couple of days, back and forth and into different rooms.

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