Thursday Thirteen #5: Our Toys

Toys. Efurryone should have a stash of fun stuff to play with. The Feline Americans and I have MORE than our share of terrific toys that we keep in our little green mousie toy box (actually, we strew them all over the house and Mom puts them away in our toy box).

For this edition of the Thursday Thirteen, I thought that I'd sift through our toy box and display our thirteen favorite things to play with. Think of it as a sort of feline "show and tell." Here they are ... In no real order (other than #1).

1. Paws down, the LASER BEAM toy is a number one pick ... There isn't a single Feline American who won't go completely wild when Mom takes the laser beam toy off the bookshelf. (F.A. note: Lucky Charmz knows where Mom keeps it and will stretch his full length and grab at it whenever ANYONE walks past that bookshelf.)



2. FEV-VER BUTT (or any other kind) MOUSIES are our second favorite. When Mom was setting up the mousie shot, Sparky Fuzzypants kept stealing mousies off of the display. Look to the end of this posting for candid "out-takes" of Mr. Pants hindering the photo shoot ...





3. BONKY BALLS and JINGLE BALLS go into the same category since Bonky Balls are just jingle balls covered in catnip-scented felted wool yarn. Mom got us a REAL Bonky Ball from Prairieland Herbs and then attempted to create her own (to mixed success) with some yarn and a couple of broken jingle balls.



Needless to say, Lucky Charmz swears by these toys for hours of chase-and-fetch fun!



4. THE WHIRLY BIRD is a toy that we received for Catmas from Mom. It's a handmade toy and it's totally AWESOME! We first heard about this toy on Skeezix the Cat's blog, so we immediately started begging Mom for it. Lucky Charmz even pledged the contents of his piggy bank if Mom would buy one for us, but she said, "No. No more toys."



We were furry sad because Mom usually indulges our every whim (case in point, our over-flowing toy box). But Catmas was coming, so we kinda knew that we were gonna get one ...

5. PANIC MOUSE is fun, but only if Mom remembers to put fresh batteries in it and then turn it "on" so that we can bat the fluffy spider around.



6. EEEEEKS!® are Charmee's. It doesn't matter if Mom purchased one for any of the other Feline Americans ... They automatically become Charmee's because he steals them. Not a day goes by that Mom doesn't find one face-down in the water dish. After their ritual dunk-n-float, Mom hangs them to dry using a clothes pin and then Charmee's at it again. When Mom finds a "floater," she says that Charmee's makin' tea.



7. WOOLY BULLYS® are a favorite of Feline American Pumpkin. They are hard to find in the stores down here, so Mom orders them by the half-dozen online. The great thing about a Wooly® is that they're never "destroyed" by too much kitty attention. If you get one tattered, you just have your mom put it inside a sock for a trip through the washing machine and dryer. GOOD AS NEW!



8. WAL*MART fishing toys are fun. Sometimes the best toy is the one that's the cheapest. Mom hates to go to Wal*Mart, so she stocks up on these if she has to make a trip inside ... Since they're just 94¢ each, Mom buys a dozen and hides 'em in the computer room. She doesn't know that I know where she keeps 'em ... Our little secret.



9. Sesame Street Beans BERT was Charmee's very first toy. He perfected the bitey on ol' Bert. As you can see, he's been washed a couple of times, but Mom can't bear to part with him eventhough Charmee pretty much ignores Bert. Maybe I'll get him (Bert, not Charmee) bronzed for Mom as a "Mother's Day" gift. Nah ...



10. SILICONE CAUSE BRACELETS and SCRUNCHEES became toys thanks to indiscriminate stealing. Pumpkin kept taking Mom's scrunchees off of her dressing table to kick, bite, and hide under the bed. He likes that Mom can shoot them across the room for him to chase. Pretty much the same thing with Charmee and his silicone bracelets ... When they get holes in them, Mom has to distract Pumpkin or Charmee so that she can sneak the poor dilapidated "toy" into the trash.





11. HANDMADE CATNIP HACKY SACK is one of our new favorites and came in our Secret Paws from our best friend, Millie. It's pretty. It smells of super-strong catnip. It's virtually indestructable. All of us love it. Mom had to put the other two away so that they get "loved" over a longer timeframe.



12. Our TICK TOCK TEASER is one of those toys that don't look that fun until you spend some time smacking parts of it around ... and get a pal interested in some friendly competition. The 'Teaser is a great way to kill some time on a Saturday afternoon between naps and crunchin' Temptations®.



13. CAT CONDO ... What can I say? You can tell from the photo that our fur-covered cat condo (we actually have TWO!) is both loved and used. Not a day goes by that I don't leap up onto a platform for a quick look out the window. It's not really a "toy" per se, but it is something that we all play on. Good times ...




and now ... the out-takes.

These photos are of Sparky Fuzzypants "stealing" props and then taking them into the kitchen for some fast-paced linoleum hockey action. Mr. Pants fancies himself as a feline Gretzky. Dream on, Sparky!






Thursday Thirteen Participants

1. she 2. Raggedy 3. Daisy 4. Sparky Duck

5. John 6. Dragonheart 7. Suzanne 8. Lilly lu

9. mu shue 10. Skeezix the Cat 11. Zeus

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