Trixie's Spooky Sunday Selfie and Caturday Art

Hallo again, Effurrybody!

Are you all ready to celebrate Miaowlloween tonight?

I, Queen Trixie, Furrst of My Name, Empurress of Jerusalem, Israel and the Entire Middle East, Queen of Hearts, Guardian of the Boudoir, Alpha Kitty Extraordinaire,  certainly am!

Oh, yes, I almost forgot to mention, it is My Turn to lead my fursibs, the J-Cats, on the weekend blog hops - the Caturday Art Blog Hop, hosted by the Wise and Beauteous Athena and her HuMum, Marie,  and the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop, hosted by the Deliciously Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet.

Here are the blog hop badges:

             

I have noticed that Black Cats figure purrominently in Halloween Art - so I don't even need to dress up for My Sunday Selfie today! All I need to do is be Myself!
Admittedly, you can't see my terrifying Fangs in this picture, but you all know they're there, don't you? And you can't escape my Hypnotic Eyes...

However, I did need a little help with My Caturday Art, so Mummy and I popped over to LunaPic, and fiddled about a bit with the Night art effect, whch We set at 50%:

That spookified My Eyes rather nicely, I think. And then, we used some of their Clipart as an overlay, although We have forgotten the degree of transparency. Though it was probably rather more transparent than any Pawlitician or Government Office anywhere in the world, Mummy says (mol)...

As We have mentioned before, here in Israel, Miaowlloween is not generally celebrated, but since so many of Our Furriends all around the World seem to enjoy it, We have decided to have a Pawty up in the Enchanted Forest tonight, from 10pm Israel time, till sunrise - to which you are all invited.
Which reminds me - last night, We put the clocks back one hour (at least, that was Mummy's excuse for being late with Our Breakfast!!!) and We are now back on Winter Time. Sure enough, right on schedule, this morning, for the furrst time this autumn (in Jerusalem, at least), there was Sky Water.  But don't worry. The Enchanted Forest is called that for a Furry Good Reason, and even if it pours with rain tonight (which it is not expected to do), the Enchanted Forest will remain sheltered and dry.

My Brofurs, Caspurr and Shimshi, helped Me to plan the pawty. Here they are, deep in confurrence about the catering, in this beautiful picture especially created for Us by Our Dear Friend Ann, from Zoolatry:

Isn't it pawsome? Thank you so much, Ms. Ann - and June! We hope to see you at the pawty tonight in the Enchanted Forest, Junie!

And now to other mews. Last week, We mentioned Mummy's latest project with her Caterwauling Club. Well, We can now tell you that on Thursday, Mummy and her friends took part in a jazz concert, to launch the latest single by a brass band called Las Piratas Piratas. Of course, She couldn't film them herself and she is waiting to receive videoclips from people who attended the concert, in the hope of being able to combine them into something that can be embedded in her own bloggie, later this week (she usually posts on Thursday).  In the meantime, here is a link to a short videoclip taken at the rehearsal last Sunday.  Photo Credit to Noam Kuzar and Jerusalemite.TV.

And now, it is time for Us to start blog-hopping, and after that, to have a nice, long Nap before the Pawty. Before We go, We would like to remind you once more that the Evil Coronavirus has not yet been defeated, so it is still impawtant to take all possible precautions to purr-tect your Humans and yourselves.

Be well. Be safe. We love you all.

Shimshi's Autumnal Snooze: Caturday Art and Sunday Selfies

Hallo again and Shalom from Jerusalem, Effurrybuddies!

It is Me again, the Mighty Shimshon (Shimshi for short), a.k.a the Little Purrince, Furrst of My Name, Master of the Queen's Mischiefs and Captain of the Guard.

This week, it is MY turn to lead the J-Cats as We join the Caturday Art Blog Hop, hosted by the Wise and Beautiful Athena and her HuMum, Marie, and the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop, hosted by the Delightfully Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet.

Before We go any further, here are their Blog Hop Badges:

                      

 

The picture you see above is My Sunday Snoozie Selfie.  If you look at it furry carefully (biggify if necessary), you will see that I am not really snoozing. I am peeking out through half-closed eyelids, in order to Confuse the Enemy - all the better to purrform My Duties as Captain of the Guard.

In my Caturday Art picture, you can see more clearly how wide-awake I am. Purrhaps I should have used that one for my Sunday Selfie. I don't know. You decide. At any rate, We used several different effects here, all from our favourite, LunaPic.

In Our furrst attempt, We kept things simple, using just the Negative filter:

After that, We Mummy went a little crazy, using Sunshine at 80%, followed by Redblush at 50%, giving a sunny autumnal afternoon effect, and then She added an overlay of autumn leaves at 70% transparency.

It's not too bad, actually, but let Us know what you think in the comments section.

We have been giving some more thought to this Halloween business. As We have mentioned several times, Halloween is not generally "a thing" in Israel. On the other paw, however, there are no more Mewish festivals until Hanukkah, in December - and since We kitties love to party, We have decided to "adopt" Halloween, so We can share in the fun with all of you.

In further Mews, Mummy and her Caterwauling Friends have yet another Project planned for later this week, about which We shall miaow next time. At any rate, that means We must keep this short, so She can go and have a Nice Long Nap before rehearsal tonight.

Before We go, one more reminder that the Evil Coronavirus has not yet been defeated, so it is most impawtant that you and your Humans, whether vaccinated or not, continue to observe all precautions to avoid catching that Sneaky Bug!

Be well. Be safe. We love you all.

Angels: Caturday Art and Sunday Selfies

Hallo again, Effurrybuddies!

Today, for Our Caturday Art and Sunday Selfies, We are featuring one of Mummy's Angel Kitties - Possum the MagnifiCat, who flew away to the Rainbow Bridge nine years ago come Thursday. On October 21st, We will commeowmorate his passing, and in his honour, Our Entries in this week's Caturday Art Blog Hop (hosted by the Wise and Beautiful Athena and her HuMum, Marie) and the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop (hosted by the Always Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet) will all be of that meowvellously floofy mancat, who, together with his sisfur Pixie, was one of the co-founders of this blog.

So furrst up, here is a picture of Possum when he was quite a young kitty. Mummy does not know exactly when the picture is from, because it was taken on one of those Ancient Cameras with film in that you had to take into a photography shop and have developed, and later, scanned into the computer. But it must be before 2006 because that is when Mummy got her furrst digital camera.

The next photo was taken on August 1st, 2008, on Mummy's second meowbile phone (and the furrst to include a camera) when Possum would have been about 13 years old:

As you can see, Possum was a creature of habit. He had his Favourite Places to hang out, and the bed was one of them.  Nor does he appear to have aged one little bit between the two photos!

The last photo was taken on the same meowbile phone, and as it is dated November 8th, 2006, it must be one of the earliest digital photos Mummy took. At any rate, it came out a bit fuzzy:

That being the case, We thought it would be the purrfect choice for artification, so off We went to LunaPic and added the Grey Art Effect at 65%, as well as an elegant frame:

But We decided that even that was not enough to give due honour to Angel Possum, so We paid a visit to PhotoFunia, and THIS is the final result:

Now Mummy's eye's have gone all leaky, remembering her sweet, floofy boy...

And, speaking of Angels - this past week, We were all shocked and grieved at the sudden loss of beautiful Giulietta of the Kitties Blue. We send Our Condolences to her pawrents. We are sure that Possum and his sisfur, Pixie, as well as Mummy's furrst kitty, Minxie, who went OTRB before Mummy effur had a blog or even a meowbile phone, would have been waiting to greet Giulietta and show her around and make her welcome.

Now, it is time to go blog-hopping and visiting all Our Furriends. Never put that off, because Life can be shorter than expected and you may find it is too late to tell them you love them.

So here are the blog hop badges:

            

And once again, We want to remind you all that the Evil Coronavirus is still here among us, and so you need to make sure that your Humans continue to take effurry precaution, even if they are vaccinated.

Be well. Be safe. We love you all.

Getting Ready for Halloween: Caspurr's Creepy Caturday Art and Sunday Selfie

Hallo there, Effuryone!

Furrst of all, I want to make it quite clear that there is NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, NOTHING WHATSOEVER creepy about Me, Sir Caspurr the Courageous, the Caspicatious, Furrst of My Name, the Snuggle-Bug, Commander-in-Chief of the Impurrial Forces and King of the Tigger-Tabbies!


No sirree!

But since Halloween is just three weeks away, We thought We would start purractising - especially since, not being accustomed to celebrate Halloween here in Israel, We sometimes forget about it when it actually comes around!  

As you no doubt know by now, We take it strictly in turn to lead the J-Cats on the Caturday Art Blog Hop (hosted by the Wise and Lovely Athena and her HuMum, Marie) and the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop (hosted by the Always Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet). It thus falls to Me, Caspurr the Courageous etc. etc., to share with you - THIS:

 

This is My Sunday Selfie. What do you think of those Fangs?

Scary, right?

And here is the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop Badge:

For Our Caturday Art, We went looking for an autumnal theme on LunaPic, and came across the Creepy Art Effect, which Mummy thought would be quite suitable for Halloween, although I have to say, I can't really see anything purr-ticularly creepy about it.


Here it is, at 95%:

But We still weren't completely satisfied, so We went over to PhotoFunia and added a somewhat literary setting, still keeping to the Autumn theme:

And here is the Caturday Art Blog Hop badge:

Next up, since Trixie was so generous as to feature ALL of Us when it was her turn to lead the Blog Hops, I feel I can do no less. So here is a picture of Me and My Brofur, Shimshi:

And here is one of the Beautiful pieces of Digital Art made for Us by the Hugely Talented Barb aka Mom from the Cats-astrophic Events blog, where We were absolutely thrilled that We won a draw (something which does not happen often). This is Trixie in all her floofy splendour:

Thank you once again, Barb.

And now for a complete change of subject. 
As you may recall, last week Mummy mentioned her latest Mewsical Project and We purr-dicted She would write about it on her own bloggie.
Well, We were right. She did - and here it is!

Two things before We set out on the Blog Hops. Furrst, We would like to wish Our Furriends in Canada a Happy Thanksgiving.

And second - since the Evil Coronavirus has not yet been vanquished and since the Flu Season is now looming as well, We want to remind effurryone to exercise Due Caution and Diligence and take all the necessary Precautions to avoid infection.

Be well. Be safe. We love you all.

Trixie Still Reigns Supreme: Caturday Art and Sunday Selfies (Plus a Twofur)

Hallo again, Effurrybody!

Mummy was so impressed by my Nobility and Generosity last week, sharing My Post with My Brofurs, that She agreed it would be appropriate and fitting for Me to lead the J-Cats again this week, on the Caturday Art Blog Hop (hosted by the Wise and Beauteous Athena and her HuMum, Marie) and the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop (hosted by the Effervescently Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet).

So here I am, enjoying an autumn sun puddle on My Royal Couch, by the living-room window:

You can't actually see the sun puddle, but I think you can discern the subtle effect of the sunlight on my normally jet-black furs.

Since this is my second week in a row, I have decided to give you, as a Bonus, another Twofur of the Pesky Mancats My Brofurs, before showing you the artified version of My Selfie:

And now, back to Business. 

For my Caturday Art, We used LunaPic's Coffee Effect at 85%, that beverage being such an impawtant part of Mummy's daily routine (mol) - though to be completely honest, since she caught the Evil Coronavirus, She has been drinking a lot more Tea, which She credits with having played a major role in her recovery!

We then overlaid that with the Stained Glass filter at 45% and placed the whole in an elegant frame, thus:

And now to other News. 
Mummy has an Exciting New Mewsical Project in hand. Together with seven other members of her Caterwauling Club, She has formed a Women's Ensemble which has been named Alma.  That is a word-play. In Hebrew, Alma (עלמה) means a young woman (wishful thinking, Mummy? - mol), but by changing one letter (עלמא), it is also the Aramaic word for the World, and since the repertoire includes Mewsic from all over the World, it is a furry suitable name.  They spell it the second way.  Anyway, tomorrow, they will be appearing for the furrst time, at a retirement home quite near to where We live, in a concert which includes songs from ten countries in almost as many languages. So let us put Our Paws together, and wish Mummy and her Caterwauling Companions, effurry success in their Endeavour.  I expect She will be delivering a full report of the concert on her own bloggie, later in the week.

Before We forget, here are the Blog Hop badges:

                      

And finally, We leave you for another week, with the reminder that the Evil Coronavirus still stalks the Earth, so make sure your Humans continue to exercise the Greatest Pawssible Caution - and you Kitties, keep washing those Paws!

Be well. Be safe. We love you all.