I was on Facebook the other day and was served an ad for Skyboy Photos offering me five free cards. I am highly skeptical of all Facebook ads, but the images on the ad were pretty so I thought I would check it out. He had some lovely art, but even better he had a kitty photo, so I figured I'd risk it. I ordered a number of cards that I could use as condolence cards.
David Bayard, who runs Skyboy Photos is a photographer, poet, and woodworker with a lifelong love of the natural world. He is also pretty adorable. I had a few interactions with him on Facebook and it made me want to put this out there so people could check out his work.
The cards are photographs adhered to nice card stock and I was very happy with the quality of them. Individual cards are $3.50 and a box is $18. I just checked out his page and it appears he is still offering five free cards, so check him out to see if that offer still stands.
I was not compensated in any way for this post. I just really like David and his work and thought I would share it.
Way too long ago I purchased a kit to make a nose print necklace from a promotion Precious Metal Prints did. I bought it with the intention of making a noseprint of Jack, but when the kit arrived we were attempting to sell a home and it sat in a pile of "these aren't bills" mail that got stuck in a box and I didn't uncover it until long after we moved and Jack was gone.
I was heartbroken and I wasn't sure what to do with it and then one day Muffin came up and stuck her nose in my ear for the millionth time and it seemed most appropriate to use her nose instead.
The kit came with what looked a bit like a contact lens case with a two-part white and blue silicone epoxy. You mix it together with your fingers until it is a uniform color and then "smoosh" your cat's nose in it (or dog, or whatever you would like)
I was least comfortable with that part, as Muffin wasn't feeling well at the time and the last thing I wanted to do was make her more so. The first time I tried I got a decent impression but she moved unexpectedly and I ruined the impression.
They warn you that the silicone sets up quickly, and I was able to try a second time which came out poorly so I tried a third. By that third time, it was becoming less pliable and so I decided to go with it, which is why the print isn't quite as defined as I would have liked.
I packed it back up in the packaging they sent along with it and sent it off. They returned it pretty promptly and I was thrilled with it.
The back of the pendant
a close up of the nose print pendant
I wore it for a few days after Muffin passed, but I remembered what happened to Susan Willett at a conference we went to a few years ago when a pendant she had for her blog Life with Dogs and Cats fell off and she lost it. I could not bear the idea of losing this and she was gone and I could not get another, so I have stored it away with her other keepsakes.
I am posting now because they have a 25% off sale currently going on if you use the discount code PETS that I found on their Facebook page. As of today, the price for a silver pendant is $79.99 with the code bringing it down to $60. They also have a gold option which is $109.99.
This is not a sponsored post. I bought the necklace and I thought it was something you would enjoy learning about and possibly buying for your own nose print. They also do fingerprints if you have a loved one you would like a keepsake of.
I won this product from a review done over at It's all about the cats! I was not compensated in any way for this post, but I did receive it for free - because I won it.
It was sent to me via Amazon, so you can buy it there if you would like your own. I decided to let the CatMan put it together and the kittens "helped"
CatMan and Brutus contemplate the product
Zena thinks they are going to need a lot of help
I am here to save the day!
Dude, what are you doing?
I think you are supposed to do something with this..
CatMan reads the instructions while Zoey nibbles on them
oooh, something new to stand on!
Wait, we liked it the other way
well this is kinda interesting
How are we supposed to stand in this box if there is this insert?
I was recently contacted by Art of Paws to see if I would be interested in doing a review of their Heated Pet Mat if they sent me one for free. After checking out their website, I immediately replied yes. I was kinda hoping they would throw in a few of their cat shelves too, but it looks like I'll have to buy those on my own 🐱
Anyway, back to the heated bed. I had all kinds of ideas when Maya offered to send it to me. I was told it would fit two regular sized cats, so I thought I would put it on the guest bed for Eli and Skippy who tend to hang out on that bed more than our bed. When it arrived I didn't think it would fit two regular cats as it is 23 x 17 inches. I put it on the guest room bed, but no one was interested.
So then I moved it to the office.
What kitty doesn't love a heated bed. And as I suspected, it appeared to be the right size for one cat.. but then:
Muffin decided she wanted to be the new spokeskitty for Art of Paws and did her best to flirt her way into a good photo.
I didn't tell her that the mat wasn't made specifically for her, so she has totally claimed that to be the truth and she is loving having a nice warm soft place next to me to nap while I work. Just don't tell her that when she wanders off to make sure the house is still in one piece that someone else uses it.
Now usually when I do reviews, I tell you what I don't like about a product... the most negative thing I can say about this is I don't have a good plug to plug it in. Thankfully it comes with a six and a half foot cord so it reaches to the plug on the other side of the room. I like that it has bite protection from the switch to the mat and that the fleece cover is removable and washable. My cats like everything about it. When I forget to turn it on (I turn it off when I'm done working because my cats don't hang out in my office when I am not working) they still use it. It uses very little electricity according to their website - only 10w. Bonus: it comes with a three-year 100% satisfaction guarantee.
Thank you to Art of Paws for the opportunity and for the mat.
If you would like to check them out you can go to their website, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram.
When I went to the Global Pet Expo I was introduced to the Groom Ninja. I was offered a free product while I was there, and I know they hoped I would talk about it but no promise was given and I was not compensated in any way for this post.
When I first looked at the product, I had to say I was horribly skeptical that this thing would work for my cats or anything. Seriously, look at it.
It looks a bit like a hacksaw blade in a piece of wood. I scoffed at the idea but I watched the demonstration and the presenter was quite dynamic and very convincing. The video of the Groom Ninja being used on a horse is really interesting. I thought I'd like to try it with my cats to prove this thing wouldn't work in the real world, so when they gave me a small one I was tickled.
So, how did it work?
Surprise! I was totally wrong about it not working. It worked so well that I immediately got to writing a blog post about it in my head. It tends to work a lot better on my short haired cats vs my long haired ones. This is what happens when I used it on Skippy. The first shot shows five passes on his side, the second ten.
However, what impressed me to no end was that it has been the only tool that has ever been able to get fur off Muffin (who is a dense medium haired kitty) without her trying to kill me. Nothing else has worked. The Furminator will take the loose fur off of her but she hates it and will start snapping at me after the first pass.
Fifteen years old, this is the first time I've been able to get anything to work and I've tried all kinds of grooming devices. Since she is the one who tends to hork up small mice sized trichobezoars during the spring and fall shedding seasons, I am thrilled to have something that helps. It doesn't work as well on Jack; I haven't met a single grooming product that works well on each one of my cats
I wrote to Groom Ninja and asked if they might be willing to do a giveaway with my review. David replied and offered me not one but surprise! three of the small ones to giveaway!! The small size is perfect for cats, but they also come in medium and large sizes for dogs and horses. They also come in a rainbow of different colors and will occasionally do specialty colors to do fundraising like last November they made a silver one for diabetes awareness.
The small one normally retails for $15.95 the medium for $17.95 and the large one for $19.95. If you would like a colored one they charge you $3 more. They also sell a combo pack for $47 with the colored ones being $6 more. Free shipping kicks in when you spend over $23.
So now that you want one too, I hope you will enter the giveaway. (US only)
I was driving to Target the other day when I heard a radio commercial for a new cat litter "Slide". I was lamenting the fact that the Garfield cat litter that I loved so much because it came so cleanly off the side of the litter box had deteriorated to the point that it it barely clumps at all and very quickly the litter box started to smell like a urinal. I was wondering why they weren't making a clay litter that did that... Then the commercial happened.
Okay, it wasn't like I had that thought in my head as the commercial came on, but I had been thinking it that day, so when I heard the commercial as I was headed to the store where they sell litter, I thought I should probably look into that... and if they have a coupon I'll totally buy it.
Well.. it had a coupon! $3 off the box you were currently buying and an additional $3 for the next box. So I bought it.
I bought the Multi-cat version first. It had a faint floral scent. I have a very sensitive nose, so I can smell it. I am sure my husband couldn't. I then bought the Odor Control variety, and that has almost a citrus/lemon scent to it. Again it is pretty faint, but I notice it when I'm scooping and on my cats if they have just visited the box.
Now, for the big test, did it work as advertised? Did I give it away by saying I bought a second box? The first photo was after I started scooping. It is interesting that the product lightens when exposed to air. If you look at the first photo you can see near the clumps a faint line, that is because I started scooping before I thought take photos.
So the first go around they didn't quite "slide" off the box. They did come off easily when I knocked them with the scoop, and they came off the side fairly cleanly - not perfectly clean but not bad. I wondered if they were fresh and would come off easier if they were a little older and drier.
The next time I went to scoop, I just tipped the box up, and everything slid right off. Pretty impressive.
But how would it hold up to 'extreme use'? I held off scooping the box for a day and a half (I only intended a day, but I became distracted) I will say, I was once again impressed. The clumps didn't break, there wasn't a lot of left over bits or fragments after scooping. (ignore the sides of the box, Jack likes to stand to pee)
What is also pretty impressive about this litter is that it has no dust. I noticed it when I poured the first box out, and here is a video of my pouring the second box.
Carma Poodale recently did a review, and she found out that they add plant based materials to the clay litter to get it to clump like that. She also links to a couple of coupons that are out there.
When I bought my second box, I found a rebate code to get a box free. Go to InmarRebates.com/AHLitter submit the rebate. Once there select CDCATLT13 and you'll see the different products you can get free. I like that you can submit it right on line if you want, or if you want to print off the paperwork and mail it in you can do that too.
One other down side (aside from the very light scent which is far lighter that a lot of 'unscented' litters) is that it is difficult to open. I could punch the tab in easy enough, but pulling it up to keep the box open was quite difficult, far more so than it had to be. I wish they would find a better way to do that. This is something you have to deal with in most boxed litters, so this isn't anything unique.
Yup, this litter has won me over and I am using it in Muffin's box. We still have a boat load of litter left over from the Black Friday Sales in 2014 & 2015 which will most likely last us until BF 2017, but if not I will probably buy more of this for the main litter boxes as it is fairly price competitive with other clay litters.
At the end of last year, I won a Hot Paws giveaway from MyDogLikes.com. I'm blogging about this simply because it is an interesting product, not because I was asked to.
I was excited to win as the photos they shared were so beautiful and it looks like such a lovely keepsake. Once I got it home and looked at it and read through the directions I had to wonder which of my six cats was I going to memorialize.
This product is marketed towards a larger dog paw, so I realized that there was enough surface area to do more than one paw print. Having just recently lost Kit, who was in the middle of the pack age-wise, I was keenly aware that I couldn't be sure of keeping any of my cats around for long periods of time. I have keepsakes for the older cats, but not so much for the younger ones - which interestingly enough hinges on Twee.. those who were older than her were the elders and Kit and everyone younger... well I almost consider them the little ones.. Well, and Twee will always be the baby..
Attempting to get three paw prints in one soft disc of moldable putty was not easy..
The first attempt was not bad, but they weren't very deep. The second attempt Fleurp was not cooperating, and with the third attempt, it was Twee. Since it was Twee, it seemed fitting, so I decided that was good. I decided to add my and the CatMan's fingerprint as well and after a 48 hour drying period to set the mold, I sent it off.
It came back rather quickly and I was a little surprised by what arrived. When looking at the photos from MyDogLikes, I thought it would be smooth all over, but the underside was quite rough. There was a bit of sandy grit on the underneath as well. I wrote to the company to see if this was what they intended the product to be. Ali, the general manager at Hot Sand wrote back and said that all of the casting is done in sand molds which is why the back was textured as it was. She said that they like to think of it as creating keepsakes reminiscent of walking on the sand at the beach. The first photo is of the smooth side the second is of the textured side.
I do not dislike the texture at all, in fact, I think it makes it very interesting. It is a little disconcerting when the product you receive doesn't meet up with your preconceived notions of what it should be - mostly because you made lots of assumptions with little facts. Even if Ali had said that it should have been completely smooth and offered to redo it, I do not believe I would have taken her up on the offer... okay, maybe I would have, but only so I could have another one for the other three. 😁
Ali couldn't have been nicer, the process was very smooth, and the product came back very quickly. Seriously, the worst thing I have to say about this is that my expectations were a bit off.. and now that you know what to expect, that won't happen if you decide you want one.
