Mr Cat's first drink from our new faucet

When we first got our flufster we gave him a standard water dish by his food and would drink it.  But eventually he stopped wanting to drink from it and started to drink water from food in the sink.  I still gave him a water bowl and changed his water every day.

Mr Cat loves the wheat grass (which is cat grass) I buy from the grocery store too.

My tutorial for Mr Cat's hoodie at my other site Oh You Crafty Gal

I made Mr Cat a hoodie for winter.  I decided to make one last winter when it was actually too cold for Mr Cat and he wanted to come inside.  When Mr Cat wants to come inside you know it's cold!  We usually have to bring him in kicking and clawing and with the lure of treats.  He loves being outside climbing trees and yes the house (that nearly gave me a heart attack).  I started on it late in the winter and when it was warming up it seemed kind of point less.  I finally finished just in time for winter and I thought I'd share it here.  I posted a tutorial for it on my crafty blog Oh You Crafty Gal.  I didn't know what he would  think of it when I was making it but he actually seems indifferent to it.  It's only when he grooms himself that he gets annoyed with it.  I think he doesn't seem to mind it since I used Velcro closures so it's easy to get on and off of him. 

I was wondering if anybody else was crazy like me and had made their cats hoodies too, so I did a search online.  Apparently I'm not the only one.  I found a site with over 50 pictures of cats in hoodies.  It was so funny.  If anyone else has made a hoodie for their cats I'd love to hear about it. 

Check out over 50 pictures of cats in hoodies. I laughed so hard.  This one looks like my cat.

Don’t forget to “like” us on Facebook.  Let’s be friends on Pinterest and we can follow each other on Twitter and Google Plus.  And check out my other blog OhYou Crafty Gal.  

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As I stated in my last post we had to hastily harvest anything we could due to a possible freeze.  I decided to cut down our catnip leaving about 6" of the plant and we brought all the catnip in to dehydrate it.   Our cat was beyond excited about our catnip harvest.  Especially when we started hydrating!   My husband said it reeked of catnip.  I think our cat got a contact high because we was running around with the crazies all night.  I felt like a dealer hiding the baggy from him and having him trying to figure out if I was "holding".  With the baggies piling up in my drawer that looks like pot, I couldn't help but think how funny it would be if the cops tried to come in and bust me only to find out it's catnip.

I have always just dehydrated herbs here and there in our dehydrator, but we had a lot of stuff to dehydrate this time and it was late, so I was wondering if there was a better way or just how to store the herbs until I could finish dehydrating them.  So I turned to our book "The Backyard Homestead"  by Carleen Madigan, (which I highly recommend it's one of the best homesteading books I've seen so far), to see what she said about drying herbs.  She gave one option as dehydrating in the microwave.  She said it only takes minutes in the microwave.  "Sweet..."  I thought and tried it per her instructions dispute the fact that she said to be careful 
about not getting them to dry because they could start on fire.  Well..   mine actually did catch on fire! After my experience, I think I know how to still utilize the microwave but more safely.  Read below for how to utilize the speed of the microwave safely. 

An Option we are considering for Mr Cat's Dry food

This weekend we decided to go shopping and researching at Chuck and Don's for better food for Mr Cat. I know what we currently feed him isn't the best, but I didn't know what else to get him. While I haven't done a lot of research on grain free pet foods, but I was thinking that it probably would be best to go grain free since logically cats would never eat grains in the wild it can't be good for them.  I think it only makes sense to feed them as close to a meat only diet as possible. Also what do we feed livestock to

Petromalt natural hairball relief petroleum free

I found the need to get a kitty laxative/hairball relief, don't ask it's a long story, and was horrified at the ingredients listed under the typical hairball elimination paste.  Thank god I read ingredients!  The main ingredients you ask?  Mineral oil and Petroleum Jelly, which are by products of oil production.  Yuck!  I'm sure that's great for them.  Lets feed them oil to eliminate fur balls....hmmm....?

Thank goodness I found a natural version!  No petroleum products for Mr Cat!  The one I purchased is pictured above.  It basically has cooking oils and flax and cod oil, with soy lechitin and beeswax.  Much better!

Don’t forget to “like” us on Facebook.  Let’s be friends on Pinterest and we can follow each other on Twitter and Google Plus.  And check out my other blog OhYou Crafty Gal.  

©Minneapolis Homestead www.theurbanhomestaed.blogspot.com All rights reserved. Photos and content cannot be reproduced

I was horrified and laughing at the same time this mourning to find my cat yet again breaking into our greenhouse that we hoped would be cat proof.  Obviously our plan failed....

We have plenty of plants that should have been transplanted  a while ago, but due to our late season, and constant rain interfering with expanding our garden.  Hopefully we can transplant the before Mr Cat gets to them again!

Don’t forget to “like” us on Facebook.  Let’s be friends on Pinterest and we can follow each other on Twitter and Google Plus.  And check out my other blog OhYou Crafty Gal.  

©Minneapolis Homestead www.theurbanhomestaed.blogspot.com All rights reserved. Photos and content cannot be reproduced

Why I have stopped using Clay Based Litter and So Should You

I recently learned that the dust particles in clay based litter is considered carcinogenic.  After learning this I started thinking about all the times I cleaned my cat's litter box, about him tracking it all over the house, and about the possibility of him ingesting it while grooming himself.