Category Archives: Cats

All I want for Christmas is a wheelchair lifter

December 17, 2012 By in Cats, Disability Tags: , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

The car has been at the engineering shop for 2 weeks. The lifter has landed on the roof but apparently the seat modifications aren’t completed. Like nearly everything in the disabled world; it is happening very slowly. I am getting pre-Christmas crankiness.

Andrew and I went to the shops today – in my car. The wheelchair lifting part was all good – when we’re together that’s my job and I manage it with reasonable ease. The getting in and out of the car without a fixed transfer board – slightly more tricky. Not to mention that my car is somewhat smaller in the door cavity than his – really not ideal at all.

Pickup of the car is scheduled for Wednesday. I have my fingers crossed for Wednesday. And my toes. And my legs. I’m crossing everything.

Satin stitching the wheel on the quilt

Satin stitching the wheel on the quilt

In the meantime I’ve started to stitch the wheel onto the quilt. My first attempt looked like a pizza. A blue and purple pizza but a pizza just the same.

My second attempt, I cheated. I used the wheelchair wheel and like a 3rd grader – traced it! Harder than you may think as the wheel is not perfectly flat.

Then when it came to the stitching I found that the top layer was all puffy. All those hand basting stitches to keep the batting, backing and top together weren’t holding it down enough. So, with some swearing under my breath, I set about unpicking 2mm satin stitching.

I dragged the quilt to the armchair – I may as well be comfy.

Licorice appeared. Licorice was persistent. We reached a compromise. She could sit on the piece of fabric resting on the footstool as long as I could hold on to the end I was still unpicking. Minutes later – Saffron wanted her share of the quilt. Nevermind that Licorice was already sitting on it; she just climbed up and wriggled her way in. The funny part was watching her slowly descend. It wasn’t a quilt – it was quick sand. For Saffron had decided to sit on the quilt but between the footstool and my on the armchair. Eventually I gathered up enough of the fabric and pushed her enough onto the footstool that she stopped sinking.

Of course I just had to take a photo.

Double trouble on the quilt

Double trouble on the quilt. Licorice (left) and Saffron (right).

The cat who dislikes bipeds

November 30, 2012 By in Cats, Disability Tags: , , , , , , 2 Comments

The wheelchair may freak the cat out, they said. They may run from the wheelchair. It may be big and scary.

To that, codswallop say I!

—

Gesso is doing his usual and running away from me again. I go to pat him, approaching slowly and so he can see me coming. He runs away.

‘Hop in the wheelchair’ says Andrew.

I jump in. Gesso stops and looks.

Andrew prompts: ‘Give him the signal’.

I move the fingers on my hand like a quacking duck. (Andrew has been trying to teach Gesso that this signal means come. Teaching a deaf cat – good luck with that. A regular cat is bad enough at coming when called!)

To my surprise, this bundle of white fluff, runs back towards me. I pat his head. He is no longer terrified.

—

IMG_2936So it would seem that Andrew’s theory is right. Far from being scared of the wheelchair, as some feared he would be, he is afraid of bipeds! How strange I must seem – this tall creature that moves quickly through the house.

—

It’s been a tough couple of weeks catwise, what with losing chilli and now, since Tuesday, Saffron having acute cystitis. She’s been to the vet – TWICE – and is going back tomorrow. Third time lucky? She has improved ever so slightly (meaning less blood; still frequent – small – urination).

The upshot of all this is Saffron has been confined to the bathroom for the past few days. I’m sure that this freaks her out a little more, however, she is wee-ing (or at least attempting it) so frequently that I can’t trust her outside the bathroom.

Licorice is highly unimpressed as she too, has been calling the bathroom home for the past 4 days. (The girls don’t like separation and I have few other places to put a litter tray should I lock Licorice out of the bathroom). So I am left with one cat who squats frequently and one who is just plain grouchy. She lets me know of her displeasure at every possibly opportunity.

So it would seem there is one member of my furry flock left; is he grumble-free? Well, bipeds are most certainly ok with Pickle. As far as I know, his bathroom business is all in tact and he has the run of the house. So all in all, I think the ginger ninja is a happy camper. Here’s a photo I captured of him earlier this evening.

HIs whiskers look rather grand in profile!

HIs whiskers look rather grand in profile!

Chilli

November 18, 2012 By in Cats Tags: , , , , , , 9 Comments

Today it was time to say goodbye to Chilli who has been in our family for almost 13 years.

Awww
She’s had a number of health problems over the past few months and this morning at about 7am she took a turn for the worse and we knew it was time.

Typical chilli – whenever she had a bad turn it was rarely during business hours. Mum and I sat with her waiting until it was near 10 when the vet opened.

With so much trouble breathing, the kindest thing to do was to put her to sleep. She drifted away very peacefully.

We took her home and put her near the rose mum and dad just planted for their 40th wedding anniversary.

Chilli loved to have conversations with mum, dad and I. She was a great talker, good at rolling and having a little tummy rub and watching the world cautiously from a distance. She will be missed.

The treat stealer fails

October 30, 2012 By in Cats Tags: , , , , , , , 2 Comments

Licorice seemed to be quite skilled at stealing the treats Saffron had so diligently retrieved from the treat ball. It is clear to me that Licorice has also been stealing some of Saffron’s dinner. However, I think Saffron has finally figured out how to outsmart Licorice! I took this video tonight and Saffron is certainly now getting the lions share. I love the way licorice (right) looks at me at one point with her sad face!

If the above video doesn’t load, go directly to the flickr page.

I want to stress that it’s 1/4 of their food allowance in the ‘treat ball’. They are overweight and don’t need treats. I’m putting it in the ball because Saffron has finally figured out how to get most of the treats for herself and stop Licorice stealing hem. This is a good thing because I’m positive that Licorice takes some of Saff’s breakfast each day! I also put it in the ball because it’s a bit of environmental enrichment and keeps them moving… however slow that may be!

Other videos from my furry family:

 

 

A quilting collaboration

September 26, 2012 By in Art, Cats, Sewing Tags: , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

‘Why don’t we make a quilt which is our story?’

Detail of Quilt centre piece

Bronze metallic lumiere paint on purple cotton quilting; unfortunately photograph doesn’t show true colour of paint – see below for a better likeness

Ever since then, I’ve been playing around with different paints on pieces of fabric. It took some weeks before I summoned up the courage to just start painting. In the end, I opted for one of the easy options by using the lumiere paint. I didn’t need to put any additives to make it suitable for fabric. Also it had a thick enough consistency that it took to stenciling and freehand painting well where other options bleed. Still, I was tentative about starting.

To mitigate my nervousness I chose an affordable plain purple cotton quilting fabric as the backing.

The tree stencil, Andrew and I chose together. It came from Stencil Kingdom in the UK and it is enormous (over 40 inches wide) but spectacular. The original stencil is wider than it is long, however, in order to suit  being part of a quilt, we’ve altered it slightly to reduce the width and increase the length. Much to Andrew’s delight, I volunteered him to do all the freehand joining bits!

Quilt centre piece

The colour here is a better likeness

In return, I got the task of hand-stitching on the black cat in the tree. Mister had a go at hand stitching and after a few moments complained that his hands hurt – a likely story! If anyone is wondering whether this cat is Licorice or Saffron, I can tell you it is neither. The reason for the black cat is that Andrew keeps telling me he needs a black one to go with the white and ginger one. He thinks then he will have one of each colour. Everytime he says this I point out that cats come in more than just 3 colours and our fur family is complete! So, to humour him, I have provided him with a black cat in spirit – or stitch! End of argument.

Of course, Licorice, Saffron, Pickle and Gesso will have to make an appearance somewhere in this collaborative effort. At this stage, Gesso will arrive in the form of a squirrel – one of his nicknames. He’ll be purple as white would stand out too much. I think it’s fine that Gesso is going to be an odd colour. He has painted himself with enough colours to date that he clearly doesn’t want to be white! As there was no way I was going to stitch a squirrel, I’ve ordered one from Applicuts.

As for the other three… well, time will tell how they appear in this piece!

The best toy for a deaf cat

August 29, 2012 By in Cats Tags: , , , , 4 Comments

It seems hard to predict which toys Gesso will enjoy. His deafness seems to mean that some items are of no interest to him. I’m not sure whether it’s because once they move out of sight a rod and stick toy loses it’s interest as he can’t hear it. Strangely, the red dots from the laser can also disappear but Gesso keeps looking for them.

Andrew shot this piece of footage of his antics.

If the embedded link above is not working please go to the youtube link.

PS: If anyone in Sydney is looking for one of these laser toys – it changes shape at random – I got it from Cat Protection Society in Enmore.

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