Adopt-A-Cat Month®

As you know, June is Adopt-A-Cat Month®. In honor of Adopt-A-Cat Month® I've added a new page to my blog - I Need a Home Please! On it is a widget that features cats from my favorite shelter, Duncan's Place, a Cat Sanctuary. If you click on it, it takes you to Petfinder.com and you can look up pets everywhere. It looks like this:



I hope you'll visit Petfinder.com. You can get a widget like this one for you own blog. Or, you may just find your new best furriend there!

It's Saturday and that means bloghop! Join the fun.

My First Blogiversary

Today is my first blogiversary. I can’t believe a year has gone by so quickly. And what a year it’s been! Better get comfy because this blog’s gonna be a little on the long side. MOL!

Here’s a partial list:

My sweetie Curzon

1. Joined Twitter, Fursbook, and Facebook and started blogging.
2. Gained over 1,000 Twitter followers, 246 Facebook friends, and almost 100 regular blog readers.
3. Wrote 97 blogs here and a couple over at Anipals Read.
4. Tweeted over 13,5000 tweets. (I’m a real chatterbox, aren’t I?)
5. Met tweeters from all over the world and made tons of amazing friends.
6. Sadly, had a bunch of friends go OTRB.
7. Wrote (well, edited) a book. More about that later.
8. Adopted a shelter to help support (still working on how to do that effectively).
9. Went to Blogpaws West 2010.
10. Stayed in a hotel!
11. Went lots of cool places in my stroller.
12. Met some of my twitter friends live and in person.
13. Went out to dinner at a restaurant. How many kitties can say they’ve been to a restaurant?
14. Been interviewed for Cats Who Twitter and Anipal Times.
15. Adopted two fursibs, Candy & EK.
16. Joined #pinkangels and got a cool Hello Kitty motorcycle.
17. Became a barktender for #nipclub & #pawpawties.
18. Got an even cooler vehicle - a Lamborghini Gallardo.
19. Had a hareem for a while, but now I got a sweetie - Curzon from @UsCoons.
20. Was bridesmaid in a wedding and am going to be in another one.
21. Attended lots of pawties.
22. Won mountains of super cool prizes.
23. Got Toki Poki cards and traded them with my friends.
24. Got to wear lots of cool costumes.
25. Was nominated for an Anipal Academy Award (but didn’t win).



Candy & EK

26. Entered the 2011 Teddy Olympics.

And that’s just what I can think of right now. I know there’s stuff I’m forgetting.

Most of my blogs have been about fun stuff and exciting adventures, but there have been a few serious ones, too. And I’m gonna get serious now for a little bit. As you all know, I keep trying to raise funds to help out Duncan’s Place (http://duncansplace.org/), which is where Candy and EK came from . I’ve put up a chip-in to raise some money for them. They do so much for the cats in their care and for the community and I really want to do whatever I can to help them. If you can see your way clear to donate, even just $1, please do so. 

Another way you can donate is by getting a copy of ‘Summer at the Lake with Petie’. My good pal @BlindMaximus was kind enough to write a blog about it and to put a link to my chip-in on his site. How amazing is that? @Rumblepurr is also helping. He has a link to my book on his blog. If I’ve missed anyone who still has a link up, please let me know. I want to make sure everyone who’s helping me gets mentioned. 

I’m gonna really push the book here for a minute, because of the way the website where I sell the books works. There has to be $25 in my account before they’ll cut a check. What goes in the account is the difference between the cost of the book and how much extra I added on to have to donate to Duncan’s Place. I’m short by about 4 books worth in order to get paid. It was 6 books worth, but @BlindMaximus bought a copy in addition to blogging about it, and @iamDaisyDoo bought a copy to donate for a prize for the next #pawpawty. Anipals really are the best pals. So I’m really hoping that at least 4 of you will order books so I can get one last check to donate.

And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for - the Giveaway! A while back I won a wonderful prize package from the folks at Nutro. It was very similar to this one:

It took a while until we actually got to eat the Nutro Natural Choice food that was in the prize because of Candy’s tummy problems, but we finally got to try it a couple weeks ago. We loved it!

Even more important, it doesn’t upset Candy’s tummy. We think the food is soooo good and you know how we love Greenies, so I wanted someone else to have a chance at the same wonderful prize package. I asked @EdnaAtNutro and the wonderful folks at Nutro if it would be possible to arrange one for my blogiversary. The answer was yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So it is my pleasure to offer you a chance at this package full of fun and yum. Here’s the particulars:

1. Anyone is welcome to enter for the drawing, but the prize is a cat prize.
2. Apologies to my pals outside the U.S.A., but the winner has to be in the U.S.A.

Here’s how you enter.

1. Go to the Nutro (www.Nutro.com) site and pick which formula of Nutro Natural Choice you’d like.
2. Go to the Greenies (www.greenies.com) site and pick which flavor of Feline Greenies Dental Treats you’d like
3. Leave a comment saying you want to be in the drawing and telling me which flavors you’d like.

The last step is the most important. I know lots of pals who are not entering will also leave comments, so make sure to tell me you're entering the drawing.

Comments left by April 30th will qualify for the drawing. After the 30th, I’ll throw all the names in a magic internet hat and pull out the winner. The winner be announced May 8th. Good luck!

Adopt the Internet Day

Today is Adopt the Internet Day and Petfinder.com's 15th birthday!

You all know that I was rescued from a trailer park by my mom's friend and given to mom, but not all kitties (or dogs for that matter) are as lucky as I am. Some pets need help finding new homes like EK and Candy. They're both from Duncan's Place.  Duncan's Place lists their available cats on Petfinder.com. Mom looked at lots of cats on Petfinder.com before deciding on EK and Candy.

Did you know that Petfinder.com has other pets besides cats and dogs? They have rabbits, horses, fish, birds, and all kinds of wonderful fuzzy furriends waiting for someone to love them. If your home needs a new addition, Petfinder.com is the place to start.

If you're full up, please join the blog hop and help spread the word.

Sunday Musings

Happy Sunday everyone! Yesterday was Mom's birthday, so we've been giving her extra cuddles this weekend.

Good news! Okey's Promise passed it's funding goal and @BZTAT can go forward with her project. Congratulations @BZTAT and Okey's Promise!

Pals been asking about my Turbo Track cuz we got two of them arranged together. So here's what it looks like. We love it! We all gather around it with Mom and play with it. We roll the balls to Mom and she rolls them back to us. It's just so much fun.

Speaking of fun, here's a picture of my favorite ball. It's just about an inch or so big and it's my favorite ball for playing fetch. Problem is, because it's little it gets misplaced a lot and I'd like to have more of them. But Mom can't find any in the stores and doesn't remember where she bought this one. So if you see this ball anywhere, DM me on twitter (@pumpkinpuddy) and tell me where so Mom can buy it. EK likes it too, so we need lots of them for sharing.

We recently got a wonderful present from @Staffpurrson. It's one of the Harry & David boxes that @Mulder_cat and @Scully_cat are so fond of. It came with all kinds of surprises in it.

Just look at all the fun in there! We got Temptations treats, and some Luna Tuna, some great toys, a nice fleecy pad and something we've never had before - crinkley paper! We're just loving everything in this box. Or I should say EK & Candy are loving the box and everything in it. I can't get near any of it cuz they're toy hogs. At least I get treats & Luna Tuna. Nommy!

Look how funny EK is. There's not room for both of them in the box so he just climbed right on top of Candy. But she doesn't mind. They bonded at Duncan's Place and just love each other so much that they climb on each other like this all the time.

Here's more pictures of them cuddling. In fact, it's hard to get pictures of them not together.

And here I am in all my floofyliciousness!

Aren't I gorgeous?

Gotta go watch football with Mom now. She's rooting for Green Bay and the Steelers today, but especially the Steelers. Happy Sunday everyone!

Sunday Musings

We must be the luckiest kitties in the whole world! We got wonderful stuff for Yule. Take a look!



A couple of these are videos so you may need to go to Picasa to see them.

Our pal Sweet Praline is pawticipating in Paw it Forward. We told her we wanted to pawticipate, too. So for our Paw it Forward we're gonna give some of our toys to the local shelter. We were gonna take them today, but we were talking to @BabyPatches at the #catmasweve pawty and found out her mama put lots of stuff on sale for after Catmas. So Mom ordered some more stuff from Nip and Bones to add to it. When that stuff gets here, Mom's gonna take it to the local shelter. I think we'll send Evie to snoopervise and report back on the visit.

This has been an interesting year. It started out kind of iffy. As some of you remember, we almost didn't get to keep our pretty house. But the bank people finally saw sense and fixed things so we could afford to keep paying.

Then in the summer, Mom went to Massychewsits. She was gone a long time and I was very lonely without her even though I had a kittysitter. So when Mom came home, I got antsy every day when she went to work. I was always afraid she'd leave me alone again for many days. Mom decided I needed fursibs so I'd never be lonely again. At first I wasn't thrilled with the idea, but as usual, Mom's right. Now that the squirts have been here a while I really like them. And I love having playmates. Even though I like them I'm still gonna call them squirts. MOL

We made some wonderful new furriends this year, but lost some of them before we even really got to know them. I miss Inigo very much. I'm glad Ryker decided to tweet from OTRB because otherwise I'd miss him something terrible. And there were Sniffie, Mookie, Hollie, and so many others. It's been a very sad fall. I wish we didn't ever have to be sad, but just the fact that we're here, blogging, tweeting, and making and losing furriends just shows how lucky we are. Every time I lose a furriend, I think of all the poor animals that don't have homes or furriends at all. Or worse, homes where they're abused. The fact that we're all loved the way we are truly does make us the luckiest animals in the world.

'Summer at the Lake with Petie' did fairly well. 43 copies sold, allowing me to donate over $160 to Duncan's Place. My goal was 100 copies, but I guess that wasn't a realistic goal and I'm pretty happy with how the book did.

Mom's coming up on a very busy time at work, so I'm not gonna get much computer time the next couple of months. Please forgive me if I don't comment on your blogs. I am coming by to visit even when I don't let you know I've been there. I do want to keep up on what's going on with my pals.

I want to wish everyone a Happy New Year. I hope the coming year brings peace and love to everyone, especially those that don't have it right now. I wish everyone in the world had as much love in their lives as we have in ours.

Thankful Thursday

So far I've sold 34 copies of Summer at the Lake with Petie. Today I received my first payment in the amount of $119. I haven't been paid for all the copies yet so there's more money coming (but not until next month)! I took great joy in going to Duncan's Place and clicking on their donate button and donating that money. As both Blurb.com and Duncan's Place both use Paypal, it was very easy.

Ordering is very easy, too. Just click on the picture below and it will take you to the order page!

The deadline for ordering in time for Christmas in the U.S. is December 12. Blurb.com delivers all over the world, so don't think you can't order if you live outside the U.S.

Thank you to everyone who has or is going to order Summer at the Lake with Petie. And Happy Holidays to all!

A Book About Love

We've spent a lot of time in #pawcircles and porchsitting lately. We've seen too many furriends cross the Rainbow Bridge in a very short time. When our furriends cross the bridge, the circles are for love and comfort. But sometimes, the #pawcircles and porchsitting result in a furriend getting better. This book is about a success story. This book is about the miracles that love can work.

As we all know, our pal Petie (@Petethecat) had a difficult summer. When we heard our furriend was sick, we all did what anipals do in times of trouble - we banded together to help Petie get better. And Petie did get better! In fact, he's getting married very soon to the wonderful Pandora (@Pandafur).

@toughteddybear with his copy of
'Summer at the Lake with Petie'

It was just an amazing summer, and I wanted something to remember it by. I thought others might like to have something, too. So I put together a book: 'Summer at the Lake with Petie'. I gathered together stories, poems, pictures, memories, and whatever else pals wanted to submit to the book. There is a link in the sidebar to order the book and you can see sample pages there. The book is getting rave reviews from everyone who has already gotten a copy.

This book is special not just because it's about our love for Petie and the miracles that love can work. The proceeds of this book benefit the cat sanctuary that Candy and EK came from  - Duncan's Place. It's a wonderful group of people who foster cats in their homes, help them find furever homes, and help families down on their luck keep their pets with them. I wrote about them in an earlier blog - Blog the Change - Duncan's Place.

One thing we've all said over and over the last several weeks is how lucky our now lost pals were to have had loving homes. I want all the kitties at Duncan's Place to have that, too. Selling 'Summer at the Lake with Petie' is one of the projects I have going on trying to raise money to help them take care of and find homes for the cats in their care. My goal is to sell 100 copies of the book. So far, 30 copies have been sold, so there's still a long way to go.

I want to thank some pals who have been helping to spread the word about Summer at the Lake with Petie:

Rumblepurr put a link up on his blog: Rumblebum.

Whskr And Dash wrote a blog article about it on their blog and plan on writing another: Dash Kitten's Musings.

Blind Maximus wrote a blog entry and put up a widget for ordering Summer at the Lake with Petie on his blog, Adventures of a Blind Dog in a Big World.

I do have the best furriends! If anyone else is interested in putting a link or a widget on your blog, let me know. I'll send you the code.

I also have a chip-in on my blog for pals who want to donate. Or you can go to Duncan's Place web site and donate there. Whether you order Summer at the Lake with Petie or donate through my chip in or directly on their site, I hope you'll choose to do something, no matter how small, to help Duncan's Place. I want every cat to be as lucky as I've been.

Much love to my furriends,
Pumpkin (@Pumpkinpuddy)

Candy & EK Have Arrived!

My new fursibs have arrived. Mom picked them up on Friday from Duncan's Place.They are very little, and I guess they're cute. But boy have they taken over! They're constantly climbing on Mom and rubbing and purring on her, the little suck-ups. EK's climbing all over her right now while she's trying to type for me. They climb all over my cat tree and have usurped my little red tent. So far they haven't gotten in my stroller, but I bet that's just a matter of time. They haven't slept in Mom's bed yet, either, so that's still all mine, too.

 EK (short for Evel Knievel. And he's definitely evil.)

Candy. She's ok. She's quieter and doesn't bug me as much.










So far they don't seem very interested in toys, so my toys are still all mine! I did get Mom all to myself yesterday for #PPPawty so Mom could type and upload pictures for me. Mom's also been trying to give me special treats just for me, but I didn't eat them. Not sure which squirt wound up with my shrimps.

Speaking of toys, most of my favorite little toys have been missing for a long time. Mom looked all over for them. She even got a friend's kid to help her look under the furniture. She even looked under the fridge. No luck. Well yesterday, we heard all this squeaking and EK wasn't playing with my squeaky mouse on a stick toy. So Mom goes to see what he found and he was reaching under the little wine fridge. Mom moved it and there were all my toys! Over a dozen of them. I was so happy to see all my toys again. I guess squirts are good for something.

Anyway, Mom went crazy with the flashy box. There's lots of pictures and even some video. I'm in some of the pictures, too. Because of the video, I did a link this time to the album. Click on the picture below to see more pictures. Enjoy!

New Kitties

So far we've sold 25 copies of 'Summer at the Lake with Petie'. I'm not sure how much money I've raised because the website keeps some and Paypal takes some, but its around $70 and probably more. Copies are starting to arrive at pals homes. @LilyLuWhoT has gotten her copy. Mine should arrive tomorrow. As you know, my goal is 100 copies sold. If anyone has ideas how to sell more books, please DM me. The kitties at Duncan's Place and the humans caring for them really deserve the help. I did look into Amazon, but that would just make the books more expensive. I guess I need ideas how to publicize it better without being annoying about it.

Speaking of help, my wonderful friends, @whsker and @dashkitten, are not only getting a copy of Summer at the Lake with Petie, but they wrote about it in their blog: Dash Kitten's Mewsings, I was so surprised!. I think that was such a nice thing for them to do. I guess I shouldn't be surprised though. Dash and his human are always writing about others and are always looking for ways to help everyone. They are some of the most thoughtful pals out there in the Anipal Twitterverse and the Cat Blogoshpere.

The other excitement this last week was Petie and Pandy's shower. The guys went hiking and the girls went shopping, and all kinds of interesting happened while we were out. Everyone had a wonderful time, and a few pals wound up in Twitter jail! That's all I'm gonna tell you. What happens in Twitter stays in Twitter!

*purrs and pawhugs*

News!

All kinds of news this week. The first item is that the book about #lakewithpetie is finished and ready to order. It's called Summer at the Lake with Petie and is available here: Summer at the Lake with Petie. You can see a preview at the right. I was thrilled at how many pals sent stuff for me to put in the book! There are poems, stories, pictures, memories, and even original artwork. We have some very talented anipals in our community. Not only is this a wonderful way to remember the amazing summer we had, but the proceeds are going to Duncan's Place cat sanctuary. It will make a great Crispmouse present for your humans, so buy lots of copies!

Duncan's Place cat sanctuary is also where my brofurs are coming from. Cathy at Duncan's Place cat sanctuary sent me more pictures of them.

I finally have names for them. The cream colored one is gonna be Evel Kneivel and just EK for short. We've been told he's a bit of a daredevil. The grey and white one is gonna be Bandit because he looks like he's wearing a mask. Mom's picking them up Friday night!


Edit: Just found out from Cathy at Duncan's Place - turns out the grey & white one is a girl. So instead of 2 brofurs I'm gonna have a sisfur and a brofur. Cathy called her Babette and I think I'm just gonna call her that and not change her name again. Bad enough everyone thought she was a boy and called her Bob all these weeks. I'm not gonna change her name yet again.

So that's the good news. Now the sad news. We lost our good friend, Gunner, this week. He crossed the bridge on Thursday. PepiSmartDog escorted him across the bridge and arranged a wonderful welcome banquet for him. The banquet was held at Nipclub so that all the anipals could see Gunner off and wish him a good crossing. It was a wonderful banquet for a wonderful pal.

That's if for this week. Next week I'll have lots of news after the brofurs get here. Wish me luck! Smoochies!

My Gotcha Day!

Happy Sunday everyone! Today's a very special day. It's my Gotcha Day! One year ago today I came to live with Mom, and it's been a fantastic year. I won't go into details 'cause you guys hear me brag on my Mom all the time, so you already know how spoiled and lucky I am.

I only got a small present, but good things come in small packages. And this package had my favorite treats - freeze dried shrimps! I may be getting something else. Mom was looking at the Petco website today. I wonder if she ordered anything?

It's also 3 weeks until the brofurs arrive. I guess I'm sort of looking forward to that. Mom's gone so much that it will be nice to have company and someone to play with.

The Lake with Petie book is half done, and looking pretty good if I do say so myself. I've heard from some pals that you want to add stuff to the book. Well get busy and get that stuff in to me or the book will be done. I'm hoping to finish it up next weekend. I'm gonna have a few pals look it over before printing to see if I left out anything important. I really want to have it done soon, so please get stuff to me this week. I think this book will not just be a great memory book of the fun we had at the lake, but also a good present for our humans for the holidays coming up. They can see what we do when they're not looking! MOL! And don't forget, the proceeds go to Duncan's Place, so it's for a good cause, too.

I have to apologize to @joeybeancat. I said I'd write about his howloween costume contest and then forgot and now the contest is over. I'm very sorry. *hangs head in shame* Please forgive me.

That's it for this Sunday. Love to all my pals!

Brofurs!

Cathy at Duncan's Place sent me pictures of the squirts that Mom's forcing on me. I guess they're kind of cute. I'll give them a chance. Do I have a choice?

The butterscotch one is named Peanut and the grey and white is Bob. I don't like those names, so I'm taking suggestions. Cathy said Peanut is a real daredevil and climbs everywhere already, so I'm thinking of calling him Evel Knievel, or EK for short. What do you guys think?

Sunday Musings

Happy Sunday everyone. Hope you all had fun at #pawpawty. I know I did. Had my first barktending gig, too. I lucked out. Everyone was so busy watching the Shibbering Cheetohs that it was slow. MOL!

Thank you all for your response to my last post. So far it's gotten 87 hits! That's a lot of hits for me. Duncan's place is just pawsome and I'm glad to spread the word about them. I hope some of you have given them a donation. They really need it. If you haven't, click on the badge on the right. It will take you to their donation page.

And speaking of Duncan's Place, Mom went up there yesterday to pay them a visit. Big mistake! She fell in love with 2 of the kittens and now I'm getting brofurs. That's right. Brofurs. TWO OF THEM! I'm gonna be outnumbered, so I better put them in their place real quick when they get here and make sure they know who's the boss kitty around here.

I don't know how I feel about this. On the one hand, it will be fun to have someone to play with while mom's out day hunting. On the other hand, now I have to share everything, including Mom's attention. I have to share my toys, my cute little red tent, and worst of all, I might have to share my pawsome stroller! It's very roomy inside, but I don't think it's big enough for three of us at once. I may have to draw the line at letting them in the stroller.

I don't have pics yet. I'll try to get pics from Cathy at Duncan's Place and put them up later. The kitties aren't coming to live with us for almost a month. One still need some tests and is still a little too young to come live with us. The other needs his mancat operation and they're gonna keep both until after that. Then they come to us.

Right now they're named Bob and Peanut, but we're thinking about renaming them. I'll ask for ideas for new names when I put the pics up.

It's a nice sunny day, so I think I'm going for a walk. Later!

Blog the Change - Duncan's Place

Pumpkin's Mom here. Pumpkin's letting me take over her blog for today.

I started this blog just for fun. It never even occurred to me that it would be anything other than fun. About the same time I started this blog I got involved in the Twitter Anipal community and started reading other pals blogs. I saw what others were doing with their blogs and with the connections they made through Twitter. I decided I needed to learn more about using social networking to help others and went to BlogPaws West 2010. I came away from BlogPaws determined to do what I could to help. I'm still going to have fun with my blog, but I'm also going to try to do some good with it.

I contacted some shelters letting them know I was looking for someplace to sponsor on my blog. It was amazing that none of the places got back to me. I finally had success when I contacted Duncan's Place. Duncan's Place is a cat sanctuary started by Cathy Campbell. They don't have a facility, so they foster cats in homes until they can adopt them out. Their mission is to make sure every cat in their community has home. I think that's a pretty awesome mission.

From Cathy: "Duncan's Place is named after my late beloved kitty. He was my first cat,and a lot of little furry lives owe a lot to him. Duncan was a Scottish Fold and was a rescue, too. I now have another Fold, Ainsley, who is also a rescue. The neat thing about Folds is that they can all trace their ancestry back to the same female Suzie, so Ainsley and Duncan are related."

I had a nice long talk yesterday with Cathy and asked her some questions. I was really curious about how she was able to run a successful cat sanctuary without a facility. It turns out she does manage to do it -  and quite well, too. Since 2008 when Duncans Place opened, they've rescued 133 and adopted out 113 cats. Not bad for a small operation with no building of its own.

Here are the questions I asked and her answers. Unfortunately I'm not great at taking notes, so the answers are all my paraphrasing and not direct quotes from Cathy.

Q: What happens to cats you can't place?
A: They stay in foster care until they're adopted. Sometimes they're adopted by the family that fosters them. None of the cats have ever been sent to another shelter because it couldn't be placed. They also try not to move the cats around to different fosters so the cats have nice, stable, comfy homes where they're cared for as part of the family until they find their forever home. Duncan's Place is a no-kill sanctuary, and cats stay in foster care until they find homes.

Q: Is the sanctuary how you support yourself or do you have another job, too?
A: Cathy is not supported by the sanctuary. She works as a vet tech and also as a massage therapist, both for humans and for animals. How she finds the time to run the sanctuary and coordinate supply distribution, listing the animals for adoptions, arranging adoptions, making sure all the cats are properly cared for, keeping up the website, getting donations, and doing all the other things that need to be done is amazing! I don't think I could do it.

Q: Do the fosters supply everything for the cats or do they get supplies from the Sanctuary?
A: Both. Duncan's Place has some extremely generous donors that give them lots of supplies. The foster parents buy some things themselves and the rest comes from the food and other items donated to Duncan's Place. These supplies are also distributed to families that need help feeding their pets and also to people helping to feed feral cat colonies.

Q: Do you find it's harder to get donations without a facility?
A: It's more difficult to get donations from the general public, but they've had some success getting donations from some corporations and some of the local businesses. Here is a list of some of the corporate donations they've received.

• Merrick Pet Food
• Avoderm Pet foods
• Drinkwell
• Bach's Flower Essences
• Catit Drinking fountains(Hagen pet company)
• Hartz
• Dr. Esley's Precious cat litter
• Idexx laboratories(FIV/FeLV/HWE tests)
• Home Depot(shed & cat enclosure)
• Lumber Liquidators(donated laminate flooring)
• Tiki Pet Products

That's a very impressive list for an organization that hasn't been around that long. And impressive as that list is, it still doesn't cover all the costs they incur. There's an equally impressive list of individual donors, but they still need help. Caring for so many cats and trying to help people in the community who need assistance caring for their pets takes a lot of resources.

Q: Is it hard to place the cats without a facility where people can just come and see them?
A: It is a little harder when people have to make appointments. On the other hand, people who make appointments are more serious about adopting. Out of 113 adoptions, only 3 cats have been returned. That seems like a pretty good track record to me!

Q: Would you like to have a facility someday?
A: Yes. Cathy would like to have a facility where the cats could be cared for in a cage-free environment. She doesn't want a large place, just a small one where the cats could get enough individual attention and be cared for in a loving environment until they find their forever homes.

I learned something about cats in foster care, too. Since they live as part of the family and interact with everyone in the household (including kids and other pets), they tend to adapt well to their new homes after adoption. I'd never thought about this before. All my cats came from friends whose cats had kittens, or were rescued from the street.

Duncan's place is about finding homes for cats. Sometimes that means helping families in distress keep their pets with them. This can be help with spaying or neutering, vaccinations, food and litter, or whatever else they can think of to keep cat and family together.

They also work with Northern Colorado Friends of Ferals. They help with the trap, neuter, release program. They've also taken in ferals that were young enough to socialize and helped them find homes.

Most of you already know about my first project to help the sanctuary - The Lake With Petie Memory Book. Pals have been sending me pictures, stories, poems, and memories to put in the book. The proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to Duncan's Place. I was hoping to have the book finished by the end of the month, but I'm waiting for one of the contributors to come back from vacation, so the book may not be ready until November. I'm still taking submissions, so if you want to add anything DM Pumpkinpuddy and I'll send you the email address to send it to. Please remember that you must have the right to publish whatever you send me. We used a lot of cute stuff that was copyrighted for #lakewithpetie tweets. That's considered fair use. But since this book is going to be sold, we cannot use that stuff without violating copyrights, so be careful what you send.

I've also signed on with Sponsered Tweets. Watch for the hashtag #ad on my tweets. For every #ad tweet link that gets clicked, I earn money. All money earned from ad clicks will be donated to Duncan's place. (@Boriskitty is doing the same thing for the places he supports, so please click on links in his ads, too.)

Sorry this is so long. Now you know where Pumpkin gets if from! Check out the Duncan's Place website, and if you can, make a donation. You can find them at duncansplace.org. You can also find Duncan's Place on Facebook (Duncans Place).

Sunday musings

Here it is Sunday night, and I haven't written my Sunday Musings yet. I was going to write about Blogpaws, but so many other pals have written about it that I don't know what to add, especially since they all write better than I do. I will say that I had a fabulous time, met some amazing and wonderful people, and learned a lot. My pictures are all in Facebook if you want to see them.

Packing for BlogPaws
BlogPaws Day 1
BlogPaws Day 2
BlogPaws Day3

This weekend I spent a lot of time at the #lakewithpetie. I had the idea that we could collect all the pictures from the weekends at the lake and make a picture book of them to sell for charity. @Petiethecat would pick the charity. I even talked to @thepetbooklady about it and she's offered to help. As usual, I got ahead of myself. I was saving the pictures people used from Twitpic and asking them if I could use them. Well I didn't think it through properly. I'd have no way of knowing what pictures were original and which were gotten from another source, or who to credit for the pictures. Also, a lot of the pictures are just too small to use. I get hold of an idea and I get a little overexcited and start running away with it. I'm nothing if not enthusiastic. MOL.

Spoke to Petie and he and his folks are ok with this project, so I'd still like to do it. I need to collect pictures from pals who have ones they want to contribute. I'd need a good size version of the pictures and assurance from the pals sending them that they own the pictures and can publish them. This way I'll know we're legal and I can give proper credit to the pals that contributed pictures.

If you have pictures to contribute to The Lake With Petie Memory Book, please send them to pumpkinpuddy@gmail.com. And remember, they have to be pictures you have the legal right to contribute. Sorry, the book won't have a picture of the alien ship cleaning up the campsite. Mulder already told me that was a borrowed picture. I'll let you all know what charity this is going to as soon as I hear from Petie. I'll know more about price and everything once I get it all figured out with the Pet Book Lady.

That's all for this week. I can't wait to get started on this project! Get your pictures in. I'd like to have the book ready in a month or so.

Update: We now have a charity. With Petie's approval, the money raised by selling the book will go to Duncan's Place Cat Sanctuary.