Remembering Angel Pixie; Caturday Art, Sunday Selfies and Holiday Greetings

Greetings, Effurrybuddies!

We are a day late this week with Our Post, because, as We explained last time, Mummy was busy yesterday with her Caterwauling Concert. But it is still not too late to join the weekend blog hops - 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 and Predictably Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet.

Mummy will no doubt write on her own bloggie, about her extremely successful concert - either later this week, or maybe next week. She has already taken a short break from writing about her adventures in Greece to bring her readers up to date on last month's Flying Mousie concert, as well as her field-trip at the beginning of this month. In case you missed it, here is the link.

For this week's blog hops, since tomorrow, December 23rd, marks the 14th anniversary of Angel Pixie's Departure for the Rainbow Bridge, We all thought it appropriate that she should be the Star of today's Post. Beautiful, gentle, graceful Pixie was only Sweet Sixteen when she received her Angel Wings. She loved Hanukkah, but was always mindful too of her many furriends who celebrate Chrissymouse instead - and there are even kitties who celebrate both and get the best of all pawssible worlds, so to speak. In addition, let's not fur-get that yesterday was the Winter Solstice. Now the Days will start getting longer again. Hurray! Anyway, these different festivals all proclaim the Coming of Light to a dark and unhappy World. So it is fitting that Pixie's Pawtrait should serve as Our Greeting to all Our Friends, both for Hanukkah, which ends today, and for Chrissymouse, which falls in three days time.

Furrst of all then, here is Pixie's Sunday Selfie, elegantly adorned with a frame which celebrates both Hanukkah and Chrissymouse. Pixie was ALWAYS furry elegant!

And now for the artifications! Furrst of all, a furry elegant composition (did We mention how elegant Pixie always was?) using LunaPic's Landscape effect at 60%, with a delicate overlay of Pen at 20%:

We think this is the most Wintry composition of the three.

Next up - and also artified by LunaPic - a combination of Crayon and Dreaming, at 47% and 34% respectively:

Finally - and again, courtesy of LunaPic, whom We have to thank for the frames also - a rich composition of Beauty (which Pixie certainly was) and Storytime (68% and 30%).

Which do you like best?

Next, We must put up the blog hop badges:

        



And now, it's time to catch up on Our Blog-hopping!

Next week, We hope to post on Sunday, as usual. Till then, be well. Be safe. We love you all.

Happy Hanukkah from Shimshi and the J-Cats

Greetings, Effurrybuddies!

Do you know what tonight is? Yes! It's the Furrst Night of Hanukkah. Tonight, we will light the furrst candle of the holiday, and every night thereafter for 8 days - er, nights (mol). And there will be yummy Hanukkah foods like sufganiyot and potato latkes (at least, Mummy says they are yummy, but We will have to take her word for it as We have neffur been allowed to eat them, because they are - so Mummy says - furry unhealthy. So why does She eat them, We'd like to know?)

At all events, We are going to have a Hanukkah pawty on Saturday evening, the Night of the Seventh Candle, up in the Enchanted Forest, to which, of course, you are all invited. It will be at 6pm Israel Time. And We are going to have tuna and trout latkes and sufganiyot with salmon mousse and cream fillings and all sorts of other goodies. And We will play with the dreidel or sevivon and there will be prizes for the winners! In short, it's going to be a Whole Lot of Fun!!!

As today is My Turn to repurresent the J-Cats in the weekend blog hops - the Caturday Art blog hop, hosted by the Divinely Wise and Beautiful Athena and her HuMum, Marie, and the Sunday Selfies blog hop, hosted by the Delightful and Predictably Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet - I have chosen to submit a Hanukkah card, adorned with menorot (Hanukkah candelabra) and dreidels.

Can you see my Pawsselain Dolly sisters, Miss Dorothea and Miss Laura, in the background?

We made three different artifications and We hope you will let Us know in the Comments section which is your favourite. All the artwork this week comes from LunaPic.

Furrst of all, We tried Fairy at 63%. We liked it so much that We left it at that, without combining any other effects, as We often do.

Next up - an artification using Watercolour at 50%:

And finally, a furry artsy-fartsy combination of K3 at 55% and Clown at 33%:

And here are the blog hop badges:

        

Before We go, We would like to give you the heads up that We might not be able to blog next Sunday, because Mummy and her caterwauling friends have a big concert next Sunday evening with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, and She has to be at the concert hall in the afternoon already for balance checks on stage. So We might not be able to post till next Monday. In case We don't manage to post next week at all, We will take this oppurrtunity, besides wishing you all Happy Hanukkah, also to wish you a Merry Chrissymouse. At all events, whenever Our next post happens to be, We say be well. Be safe. We love you all.

UPDATE: Since posting the above, We have learned of the wicked, murderous attack by evil anti-semitic terrorists on the Jewish community who were celebrating Hanukkah at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia. So far, We know of 12 people murdered. We send hugs and purrs of condolence to their families and purrayers for the full recovery of all the wounded. Despite the hatred directed at the Mewish people, We will remain undaunted and unbowed. They will not defeat Us. 
When you light your Hanukkah candles tonight, pray for the souls of the victims,  for the recovery of the injured - and for swift justice and punishment of all those responsible.

Am Yisrael Chai!  עם ישראל חי

Caspurr's Caturday Art and Sunday Selfies

Greetings, Effurryone!

How are you all today?

Here in Jerusalem, We had some rain overnight - but nothing like they had in Eilat, where it normally hardly rains at all! They had floods, the roads were blocked and the city was completely cut off! It's furry lucky that Mummy's nieces, who live in Eilat, had come up to Jerusalem for Shabbat!!!

Speaking of Mummy's nieces, one of them is going to move in with Step-Grandma. So Step-Grandma had to move all the books out of the Guest Kitty Room, to make room for a wardrobe. But there wasn't enough room then for all the books at Step-Grandma's house, so Mummy and her sister N. took a lot of them. Mummy didn't have enough shelf space for all the books She took, so She had to take a book-case as well. And that meant Mummy had to move a small sideboard from the living-room into Our Room, to make room for the "new" book-case in the living-room. Which, of course, means that Our Room is that much more crowded. On the other hand, it now looks more like a guest room than a Random Collection of Furniture (Mummy says).

Now, to more impawtant matters. I, Sir Caspurr the Courageous, the Caspicatious, Furrst of My Name, the Snuggle-Bug, Commander-in-Chief of the Impurrial Forces, King of the Tigger-Tabbies, am the Face of the J-Cats today, for the weekend blog hops - the Caturday Art blog hop, hosted by the Divinely Wise and Beautiful Athena and her HuMum, Marie, and the Sunday Selfies blog hop, hosted by the Delightful and Predictably Unpredictable Kitties Blue and their HuMom, Janet.

As is Our Custom, We have chosen a trio of selfies. They were all framed with LunaPic, but the artifications this time are from BeFunky. We like variety every now and then, you see.

Furrst of all, here is a shot of Me with some of My Friends - Snowy the Seal, Edward the Bear, Felix the Cat Who Purrs When He's Cuddled (like Me) and Mycroft the Mouse (who is hiding behind Snowy).

The artified version uses the Underpainting effect at full strength.

In the next picture, you can see how Our Room has been rearranged with the small sideboard and next to it, Shimshi's little cubby (it belongs to all of Us but it's too small for Me now and Trixie doesn't use it much either).

When it came to artifying this one, Mummy discovered that it is pawssible to combine more than one Effect with BeFunky, just as She usually does with LunaPic. So behold - here I am all artified with a combination of Inkwash at 50% and Oil Painting, the latter at full strength.

Finally, Mummy sneakily snapped Me when I was snuggled up next to her under the lovely warm duvet:

Of course, to do that, She had to turn back the coverlet and let all the Cold Air in!!!
Still, We made a mewtiful artsy-fartsy version of this with the Watercolour GFX effect:

Which one do you like best and why? Let Us know in the Comments section below.

Now here are the blog hop badges.

        

That's about it for now. We will be back, COD-willing, next Sunday, same Cat Time, same Cat channel. Till then, be well. Be safe. We love you all.