Saint-Chick-of-the-Collar

Chick with her new collar

I wanted to show Chick and Chucky's new accessories: cat collars. 'These not only have hollow tubes with address information in case they get lost, but also - and this is what it's all about - a bell.

Now that spring has arrived, the hunting season for birds is really open. I know it is in a cat's nature to catch birds and mice and anything else that is small enough and moves. I admit that I don't mind the mice or the wet plastic bags that Chick fishes out of the water. But I hate it that they catch birds. 

And now they are wearing collars. They hate it, of course. Chick especially is really good at losing hers, but I have a  fair supply of them. If she comes back home naked, I she gets a brand new model. And I must say, she bears it with the dignity of a Drama Queen. I even think she looks a bit Saintly. 

Ah well. We all have our cross to bear...

Immaculate Conception of Soult - Bartolome Esteban Murillo

Exploring

Last weekend, we stayed at my parent's house. It is for sale and has been empty for a while. The garden is its biggest asset and we wanted to do the serious gardening it needed. Chick and Chucky came along. At first, they had to stay indoors - and did a very thorough inspection of every nook and cranny.

A New Brand New World

Not really a brand new world - Chick & Chucky had been here before when they were very young. This is at my parent's house in the middle of the Netherlands (luckily, as our country is rather small, the Middle is within easy reach from its North, South, East, and West). My parents have now moved and the house is empty  for sale. Unluckily, the real estate market is pretty dead. Just about 1 in 10 houses has a 'for sale' sign in the front yard, waving at you as you pass, and nobody's buying.

Initially we wanted to go on a city trip, without any pet. Then the idea came up to go to one of the islands in the North, just us and the dogs. Then we decided to go to my parents house and bring all the anymals except the horses and the chicken. Not that there would be no room for them, but that much cattle would interfere with the Plan: to clean the house to make it look more attractive to the odd potential buyer who cares to visit once in a blue moon, and to do some gardening, since the garden really is the best part of the house, anyway.

Chick & Chucky loved it. But Chucky increasingly wanted to go outside Outside OUTSIDE! to explore. After a day, we let them, although at first we kept them inside so they'd realize: this is home, for now. I love to watch how they explore a new space - they go at it together, like FBI-agents entering a house that may have drugdealers of armed robbers hiding in one of the rooms. They really work as a team.

Once they knew they could go outside, they calmed down. At regular intervals they came in spontaneously for some food or a nap. This picture ( it consists of several pictures, taken with my iPhone and primitively stuck together) was taken after we had let C&C out from the window of my old room. As a kid, I would climb up that tree on the right, crawl along the roof of the garage to the flat roof in the front of this picture and enter my room from the window.

Cat Paw Prints

The frozen sheets of dough were lying on the kitchen counter to de-freeze; we didn't notice that Chucky was standing on them until after we had wiped him off the kitchen counter because he stepped into the pie pan - I guess he was intrigued by the baking paper.
It does look attractive, though, the cat paw prints on the dough and I'm sorry that the pie didn't need a dough-top, so the cat paws went on the bottom where you won't see them.
For a Tarte Tatin it might work - after baking, you turn it upside down. Perhaps next week?