Yes, but when it's not about cats... it's often about cats and little birds, as this picture can attest!

My aunt's kitten was mesmerized by that unexpected guest... I had to hide it very well right after! See what dear Harmien surprised me with in November... A darling little bird!

My cousin asked "ist that a decoration?" - and here I thought we were intelligent in the family...LOL!

 Birdie was accompanied by a highly practical little pouch for tissues... how suitable for the season! I like it so much that it now lives permanently in my handbag. Thank you so much again, Harmien!!
 

Right before starting its trip in the sky accross country borders, here is the feline friend (again, a mouse! :) I sent to Harmien, with a little jingle bell attached to the upper left corner:

Chouett'alors - Treve de Noel

stitched on Lakeside Linens with overdyes and gold thread

 Oh the joys of making friends through blogging... I "met" Julie through Ela, and see how these two fantastically talended ladies spoiled me rotten!! They know I admire their work and they know I love stuffed animals... it's a shame they are too busy to show their work on their blog!

Not only Ela made the most beautiful mouse for me.... isn't it the loveliest mouse you've seen? I simply can't stop looking at her!

But this biiig mouse was joined by a small cat (just so she doesn't feel threatened) made by Julie:

I love to make stuffed creatures once in a while and I know how much detailed work goes into them... thank you so much!!

Did you think this was all? Nah! The mouse and the cat were joined by this lovely representative of another kind:

Ela likes quilting, something I haven't yet tried my hands on.. for the time being, I can admire her detailed work! She also included this hand-made bag (scrapbooking is yet another one of her talents) with a beautiful skein of thread:

And that still wasn't all...she remembered I like working with felt and there was also a kit ready to make a little gingerbread man - I am still hoping to find time this week!

Ela and Julie, Julie and Ela, thank you so very much again... you know how much I am glad to have you as friends! Now that I've gathered enough points for a free plane ticket to Lyon, there is no excuse not to meet sometime next year ! :) Or here in Poland - Julie, I hope I can show you a bit of my new town :)

 Thanks for liking my free-hand spiders!! Seriously, when I draw anything by hand, you could see anything in it ranging from a lizard to a cow, so I was enormously proud to have produced spider-looking spiders! :)

Dear H. was here for a week and we drove a big part of my belongings to my aunt in Poznan where, with my cousin's huge help, they were safely brought up to the loft, where spiders (real, this time) and dust gathered since 1958 will guard them till time comes to transfer all that to my new flat.

H. flew back to Oslo yesterday. His leg looks just awful, my aunt took care of his wound daily, me, I was about to faint, and I am not so easy at that ;-) Yesterday, at the weekly visit, the surgeon said a skin transplant might not be necessary and all would heal... before summer. Ah, the good joke! As it is, H. is awfully tired with that leg thing but, what can we do.

The plan was to empty the flat more so the man who'll do the works to prepare it for selling could start working, but I am drowning under work and need to concentrate on that. So works might start in January only. Anyway, the goal is to put in on sale on March 1 and I think I'll make it work.

I'm flying to Norway next week for 4 days  to visit little Szpulka and Lucky    to meet my better half at hearing which my father only sighed loudly on the phone. Haven't I just left Norway? Don't I have tickets for end of December? Yup, but Wizzair tickets were cheap and I'm missing the little one too much. While H. was here, his old mother visited both cats two times daily - another person reconverted to cats! LOL

Still no time to open blogs, still no time to post finishes, but I'll try to write from time to time. ***Please excuse me*** for not being better at visiting your blogs lately, I am so sorry for that. I am currently scratching my head HOW on earth I can find time to make and to send some Christmas gifties but I have some done and if I find time to do the finishing... but these won't be big packages this year and I might have to send just cards also....

Talking about cats, there's a new addition at my aunt's. Last week my cousin was walking home with family and they saw a car stop near a park, unload something and drive away at full speed.

That something was this little cutie and - of course - she's staying. She looked awful when they rescued her, had to take antibiotics for a few days but is now a little ball of happiness. We're not sure of the age. Possibly between 2 and 3 months. No name yet :)

I am *so happy* another little cat was saved, she wouldn't have survived the cars on the road or the night. I am sure you think the same of the driver who threw her out. Yes, I know. Slow torture wouldn't be enough.

We've had several beautiful days of lovely sun despite the cold temperatures which some nights dropped to -6,5 C/43,7 F. Winter surely comes early this year! Within a few days the garden froze and the nature changed colors to a burnt orange, but the sun made dog walks so enjoyable. Today, the whole world has changed to an unfriendly atmosphere of strong wind, rain and general grayness. Not nice! Toska refused to go out, Happy did his morning obligations very fast, Lucky (who has short but thick woolly fur) went out for an hour and returned running at my first shouting, totally wet and hungry.
I don't have work since over a week, which is almost a blessing or at least what I really wanted to gather thoughts and stack up on good energy before my return to Poland. The last weeks had been stressing and I was overworked, so I am accepting these few days with a big smile. It's a good time to catch up on lots of small things at home and at my computer.
H's leg is healing but very slowly and it's definitely a difficult case. Nurses continue to come daily to change the specialized thingies on his wound and he drives to see the surgeon once a week now. Still on antibiotics (which we laughingly call anti-idiotics) because of the staphylococcus aureus infection he got at the hospital and a part of the wound has opened wide (eeeeek) but the necrosis seems to heal.
I feel so sorry for him, that it all is due to the blood thinning medicine he is taking after his heart op' and unfortunately such problems arise with a sad regularity even though he's very careful at preventing them. But it is also an eye-opening situation, what do we know that will happen to us later in life? He'd been in perfect health till the age of 50, and his heart condition was not due to high cholesterol, obesity or anything like that. It was suddenly discovered there was a genetic malformation in the heart, his life was saved and the quality of his live is perfect, he's certainly just as/more active than any of his active friends, but very regularly, problem arise with the blood. He goes to have it checked bi-weekly if it's okay or daily when it's not, but sometimes the problem occurs in between the good periods and most often the values jump because of a simple cold or medicine. He has now returned to work and can walk a lot better so I'll be leaving for Poland on Sunday, with Toska and Happy. Not that I look forward to it, because *a lot* of tasks await me till Christmas, but I already got my ticket back to Norway before the New Year, and that eases the heartache a bit! (also that of leaving little Szpulka here).

My blogging was so erratic over the past year that I thought it would be a good idea to catch up on the crafty part and post finishes from that period. To start, here is a box I sent last year to Jill F. for her birthday (exchange). I was so proud of me! I painted the box inside, covered it with matching fabric outside and glued a white cardboard piece to the bottom. I knew that Jill liked purple and peacocks s I chose this pattern and adapted the color. So glad she liked it! It is a bigger size box that can be used to hide all sorts of crafty treasures :)

Pinberry Lane - Mehitable Wright's Redwork Sampler

Among the birthday goodies, I added this hand-made felt hedgehog, because Jill likes them.
I used a pattern I found on the web after searching long for one I liked and I stuck pins in it :)

I'll leave you with this heart-warming video of Szpulka and Lucky. I am sure you will melt down! We sure have a very patient dog :)

Kitty love

Meet our new little cutie :)

Those of you who have me in their Facebook contacts have seen the little princess, but here she is officially!

Remember my last sad message? Life is much more cheerful now :)
A couple of days after I wrote my last post, the house was hard to be in. Everything reminded us on Felinek, but the worst was how Lucky was changing - and changing fast. I think we were heading into having a very depressed cat. He started to avoid me even more, then started to hide under the darkest corner of the largest bed, just so I could not find him and stayed there for hours, till H. came home. His attitude was making us even more sad...

That day I was able to convince H. to drive to Oslo's local shelter to see if we could find a little cat that would be joyful, playful, but at the same time cuddly, social and liking human presence. With one cat that is not exactly easy (Toska) and one shy one (Lucky), this was important. We were actually thinking of a little boy and this one caught our attention:

This was Saga's brother - Solan. But I and H. believe in the theory that when you choose a pet (if you're in a situation where you are choosing which is not often here since we seem to rescue little needing creatures), it needs to "click" between you and him/her. It didn't "click" with Solan. He was not as sweet as he looked on the picture and not very interested in us. Two other little females weren't either. Then out of a sudden, and mind you - this was after 2,5 hours in a little non ventilated room so we were getting exhausted - one of the ladies brought this little cutie, and love happened, both ways :)

Her official registered name is Saga but we might change it, as we don't use it. I call her Szpulka (Schpoolka), which means a little bobbin of thread in Polish, but it's a bit (cough, cough...) difficult for Norwegians. So we'll see!

Szpulka is very different physically from her brother. She is partly a Norwegian Forest Cat (click HERE to learn more) and some distinctive marks of it, among others her fantastic tail. The were found on July 12th walking on the streets in the district Sagene in Oslo, hence her name. When you think that she was even smaller at that time! How could anyone, I ask myself one time more? They spent two days in a voluntaree's home, then two weeks at the shelter, and here she is!

She is about 3,5 months old, but really mini-mini-mini! She looks much bigger on the photos than she really is. Just a little thing the size of a squirrel, smaller than a ferret! H. says her little body feels like an eggshell when he takes her up so he has to be careful :) She doesn't know how to meow yet, she issues little peeeps and squeeks like a little mouse so it's pretty funny.


And she must be the most friendly little thing I know. She spends most of her time on my shoulder or around my neck or on my chest or... when I type, presses her little wet button nose on mine, licks my face, puts her little paws on my cheeks and usually falls asleep while holding my nose with one paw. Basic need! LOL

It works fantastically fine with the other three tails. Toska ignores her, Happy would like to play but she's a bit afraid of his size, and Lucky - well, we're hoping for friendship or more :) I'm working a lot on socializing them in the sense that we would like them to be very good friends and here is where we are today:

 They're currently snoring together in Lucky's bed on H's desk. Life is good!

And now, I promise the next post with be about crafts. Serious.