My Furry Valentine

Valentine’s Day is fast approaching – you have been warned. This week, as something slightly different for BloginFrance, I thought I’d contribute to the build-up by making some present and craft suggestions, and throw in a recipe or two.

Valentine’s Day isn’t a big deal in our household. When the kids were smaller we’d make cardboard hearts to hang around the place and endless cards. But not so much recently. Life has been getting in the way. Apart from our silver wedding anniversary in 2011, we haven’t really been bothering to celebrate any those coupley sorts of occasions, but it’s a shame not to. Let’s bring the romance back. Actually no – that suggests it’s gone altogether, which it hasn’t by any means. But it maybe needs prodding into a slightly more active state.

So for today here are a couple of suggestions of pressies for the cat lover in your life, if there is one. They’re both books – and printed books at that, which is unusual for me, hard core Kindle convert that I am. There’s still time to get these books from Amazon before Friday if you’re really quick.

First up is I Could Pee on This.

This is a very funny little book that any cat lover will enjoy. It’s driven by the excellent photos of cats in various, typical poses. The poems are on the whole very witty, although the quality varies. However, in general they make you chuckle and in a lot of cases describe your own cat’s antics to perfection. A great gift for any feline fan you fancy.

Then comes Crafting with Cat Hair.

You might be tempted to say “eeuuw” when you see the title of this book, but don’t! It’s a fabulous, hands-on crafting book with well explained, various projects of little items you can make from hair from your beloved (or otherwise) kitty. You won’t have to shave it bare – the projects only require small amounts that you can obtain from brushing or a little judicious snipping if you have a long-haired cat. They’re felting projects and could be carried out using other animal hair or wool rovings (sheep, alpaca etc) if cat-based supplies are short.

The crafts are finger puppets, book covers portraits, tote bags, coin purses, knick knack boxes, pin cushions, badges, mittens and hats. In all cases apart from the finger puppets, the other projects consist of adding felted cat motifs to the larger objects. This is a very sensible approach since the amount of cat hair available is going to be limited, unless you have hundreds of cats! The results are very sweet. It’s a very unique and clever book which any craft cat owner will love.

Here’s a link to The Cat Gallery which is jam packed with ideas of gifts for catty (in the nice way) people. And look up ‘cat’ on www.etsy.com (like ebay but for handmade items only) and you’ll be deluged with things to check out.

And failing all else, you could buy your cat loving lover a llama or alpaca, on the basis that if they love one type furry four-legged animal then they’re bound to love another, and we happen to have some they could have, but I’ll be returning to that topic later …

Left to right: Grainne (huarizo), Windermere (llama) and Wiggo and Kiera (suri alpacas)