Fabulous Finds Friday Canvas Art from Collage.com

Jake from Collage.com reached out to me a little while ago to see if I was interested in reviewing* any of the products they sell in exchange for that product. I took a look around their website and found throw blankets, phone cases, bags, and canvas art. I am currently pairing down my throws or I would have been all over that (I mean do two people really need 17 throw blankets?) and the phone case would have been really fun but they didn't have my phone as an option.

I had been wanting a canvas print of Muffin. Oddly I don't have one. Over the years I have gotten free coupons from Shutterfly as well as a few other companies for free canvas prints as long as I pay shipping.  I even paid to have a few photos put on canvas for gifts for my family. But having owned eight cats (well nine, but Kodi died so young back in 2002 that we don't have really good photos of him) it simply takes time (or a lot of money) to get them all done.

This is one of my favorite memories of Muffin..

It is from 2011 at Christmas time when we were unloading the cat toys from the cat toy basket to put them on the Christmas tree. Every year since we started doing this Muffin would crawl into the basket after we started raiding it for toys. Every year it made me laugh and it brings me joy..

After I placed the order I did run into a little bit of an issue. My house does not have postal service so to get mail I need to have it sent to a Post Office Box. To compound this problem my home isn't actually in the town that my post office is. So, when I run across a website that won't allow shipping to a post office I am at a loss as to if they intend to send it to my home via FedEx or USPS or the such (so I need to give it one address) or if they intend to send it to my home via the postal service (you would be surprised how much of a problem this is)  I took the gamble that a currier would bring it to my house and lost.. I wrote to them about this and they informed me that they use third party shipping services so they have no control over this.. I am guessing most of you don't have this issue, so it is no big deal. They were quite apologetic and offered to replace the canvas if I wasn't able to track it down, which I did, it was just at the wrong post office.

The canvas was wrapped in a thin clear plastic bag and then put in a cardboard box and wrapped with packing ties. Absolutely none of this went to waste. The bag is being used for trash in my office, the packing ties were awesome kitten toys and the box is being used by Muffin who loves it VERY much.

I have hung it in my office where the painting of the mother cat with kittens was hanging and I absolutely love it. It has a nice color saturation and as you can see from the photo above it has a black backing on it which makes it feel much nicer than the other canvas prints I have.

I received a 16×20 Canvas for free including shipping. Standard price on their website is $89.99 and shipping for a canvas of this size is $15.98.  They are constantly running coupons and sales so if you are interested you can check them out. Right now everyone gets 50% off a canvas.. (I clicked re-order of this print to get what the standard price would be and it automatically applied the sales code)

I would not hesitate to order from them again. If I ever get off my duff and redesign the logo of this website I will probably order a tote with it for when I go to conferences. They have a wide variety of products from playing cards to pillowcases. The wrapping paper looks like it could be a LOT of fun!

Thank you Jake for the opportunity. I love my print and am very impressed with it.



*While I did receive the product for free that did not influence my review in this post at all. All opinions are mine. If the product had failed to meet my expectations it would not have made it on to the blog

The Big Goodbye

I was told that the kittens had a vet appointment on Wednesday at 3pm so I packed the kittens up and off we went. I went down to the foster room and packed up their blankets (so they would have something to smell like them) and some of their favorite toys and then rounded up kittens.

Sunsweet and Marble were the last ones to be snagged and when I turned around to find them they were sitting close together on one of the toys in the room. It was so sweet. I have said it before if they weren't picked to be adopted together I would have insisted on it.

I picked up Marble and gave her some love and plopped her in the carrier and turned around to find Sunsweet and found he decided to "use the restroom before leaving".. he is such a good boy.

Their physicals went well, no reason to put off adoption. The fecal was negative, they didn't have a fever, their heart and lungs sounded good.. so the rescue took them from me for their adoptions. Two were that afternoon another was to be the next day.

I knew it was coming, but to come home kittenless is hard.. that's okay though, the room needs a good cleaning and I'd like to get up the climbing wall we have planned.. (ha ha ha.. with this heatwave coming probably not). I also want to change out the sink in the bathroom and put new flooring down. I'm trying to decide if we want to replace the toilet that is in there and I'm thinking I do.

But I do have to say, I hope I get kittens before all that happens (since I've been looking for a sink for months now and haven't settled on anything at this point)

One final look at Hedy's kittens..

Sunsweet

Sunsweet

Slate

Midnight

Midnight

Agate

Agate

Marble

Sunsweet and Marble - being adopted together

Why Marble, when did you get an orange tail?

Midnight and Agate - and yes, the size difference is real
They are also going home together

Agate

Marble

Midnight says "Goodbye"

The removal of the kitten bits

This past weekend the kittens made weight and went off to the spay / neuter clinic and poof, we now have adoptable kittens.

The future owners have been contacted and I know they are all chomping at the bit to get them, but they have been in recovery mode here making sure that they remain in good health until that time comes. Wednesday they have an appointment for their health exams and if they come home with me from that I will be surprised. (I won't mind, but I'm guessing not)

They were still a little groggy when they made it back to me. They were slow out of their carrier and while they were hungry and ate, they didn't eat much. I checked on them again a few hours later and made sure they had enough food for the night and they did.. but like most when they have surgery, this is what they really wanted to do..

Sunsweet wasn't quite sure why his sisters were a little more testy than normal. His belly felt weird because of the tattoo but he wasn't in nearly as much discomfort as they were so he ended up wandering off and sleeping elsewhere.

They have recovered quickly. Midnight had a second incision for some reason and is taking a little longer to be back to normal, but she is totally okay and they are all active and playing and eating .. oh how they are eating.. oh how thankful I am for all of the donated food..

This was a very nice bunch of kittens.. it was wonderful getting to know them and help them grow.. but I will say, next time I'm so lying about kitten weights.. cause the disappointment from excited future owners when they aren't making weight when they are so close.. well yeah.. 😺 I can't blame them in the least.. I'm getting excited to meet my next batch of kittens (no, there aren't specific kittens waiting for me)

Throwback Thursday

I thought it would be fun to see how far they have come..

Sunsweet then

Sunsweet now

Slate then

Slate now

Agate then

Agate now

Marble then

Marble now

Midnight then

Midnight now

Happy National Kitten Day

And don't get me started with "but every day is kitten day".. look, this one is labeled as such, so let's just smile and move on 🐱🐈

This past weekend there was a request for help on FB from the woman who I deal with at the rescue I foster for. Kittens were being transported up to her and she needed some help getting them. I asked about helping but someone had already stepped up. I was fairly certain that someone was my new friend Sally so I reached out to her to see if she wanted company on her trip.  It was her and she was very open to having someone join her, so off I went. (okay, fine, Sally was super nice and came most of the way to get me for the trip)

The transport had some mechanical issues so they were very late in arriving, but once they got there we were to pick up a mom and her kittens and a group of kittens without a mother.

We met up in an abandoned Burger King parking lot (next to a well-lit gas station) and when the van rolled up Sally brought the carrier to them. They closed the door, put the kittens in the carrier and I put that carrier in the car while Sally gave them the second carrier and got the paperwork. It is a very interesting experience I must say. It was nice to be a small part of their journey to their home..

After being in a van all day in a carrier with their litter, they didn't smell the best, but that's okay. At one point I heard a bit of scrabbling and saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I reached out and found one kitten had forced their way out of the carrier (the kitten unzipped the carrier just enough) and I got to snuggle it and give it what for kisses as Sally pulled off the road to make sure no one else had escaped.

It made for a long night, but that's okay.. because kittens..