When The Amazing, Fantastic, Incredible Traveling Cat Circus Was In Town!!!

I heard about the traveling cat circus and cat rock band from the Trashy Diva blog. After that I was hooked like a feline on catnip!!!

The Acro-Cats and Rock Cats are truly an amazing, exciting, and fun show!!! Just like the title of this post, the show was amazing, fantastic and incredible! It was the best show I've seen in a long long long long time! The Acro-cats were amazing. They rode on skateboards, jumped through hoops, jumped through smaller hoops, balanced on balls, balanced on balls while walking, scaled ropes, pushed tiny shopping carts, leaped through the air from platform to platform on command over 6 feet in the air, weaved in and out between rods, even played a little bowling. It really was THAT amazing! And there were cats, cats everywhere on the stage!!!! I was truly in crazy cat lady heaven!!!

Then, just when you thought it couldn't get any better than that, the Rock Cats came out. There was a cat playing the chimes, another on the guitar, another on the drums, another on the keyboard, a chicken was playing the tambourine and cymbals, and yet another cat was playing the cow bell! Then there was the cat that sat on the skull thinking the skull was an instrument ;). That makes six cats and one chicken all on stage at the same time performing! My husband leaned over during the show and said to me... "I'm completely over stimulated!" Yep, that was the sentiment perfectly!

If you're in the U.S. and love cats you should definitely check them out... they may just be coming to a town near you. When I first heard about this show from the Trashy Diva blog the show was still something like five months away from being in San Francisco but I marked my calendar and patiently waited for the cats to come. It was completely worth the wait! For those in the area that missed it, never fear! They announced they will be coming back to SF! I'll totally be there again when they come back! This is a show not to be missed!!! Not even for a second viewing! <3

What Are We Getting Ourselves Into?

The Stage Is Set, Let The Mayhem Begin!

Cat Pushing Car

Cat Riding Shotgun While Another Cat Pushes

Cat Jumps From Platform To Girl- Whoops, Forgot To Trim Claws!

Cat Jumps From Girl To Girl

Cat Jumping Through Hoop

Tiny Kitten Scaling Rope

Yay Kitten!

Skateboarding Cat!

Skateboarding Cat!

Leaping Cat!

Extra Small Hoop

Big Cat Jumping Through Extra Small Hoop

Leaping Cat

Leaping Cat Lands Again

Cat Balances On Tube

Cat Pushing Ball

Leaping Cat Through Hoop

Cat Walking On Ball

Cat Walking On Small Ball

My Favorite, Cat Goes Shopping... BIG SALE!

Cat Balances On Skull

Chicken Goes Bowling

Cat Does Not Go Bowling

Cat Goes Bowling

Kitty Mayhem!

Kitty Ringing Bell

And Now... The Rock Cats!!!

Tuna On Cow Bell

Cluck Norris on Cymbals and Tambourine

From Left To Right: Cat On Skull, Cat On Chimes, Cat On Cow Bell, Cat On Guitar, Cat On Drums, and Cat on Keyboard

The Band's All Here, Chicken On Cymbals

More Cats Came! Eight Cats On Stage Plus One Chicken!

Things Are Getting Outta Control! Ha!

Pretty Kitties!

Me with Tuna!

Tim And I With Animal Trainer And Supreme Cat Mama Extraordinaire, Samantha Martin

Tim And I With the Cat Car

Traveling Kitty Tour Bus

Til You Come Back Again Acro-Cats and Rock Cats!! <3

Outfit of the Day:

What would an outing to a traveling cat circus and rock cat band be without cats on a dress? Just not enough cats unless you take some with you!

For this outing I wore my Heart of Haute Matey dress in It's Raining Cats which I recently got from Cats Like Us. You can see my review of this dress here. I paired this dress with a red cardigan, black burlesque-esque type striped tights, and black flats. I also wore my black cat earrings which you can't really see too well in the pictures.

Heart of Haute Matey Dress in It's Raining Cats- Front View

Heart of Haute Matey Dress in It's Raining Cats- Side View

It's Raining Cats!: The Raining Cats Matey Dress by Heart of Haute

I've been meaning to review this dress for quite some time now!

This is the Matey dress by Heart of Haute in It's Raining Cats which I got from Cats Like Us during their month-long April dress sale! This dress is a sailor style, halter top, fit and flair, A-line dress with a super cute pattern of black cats with red umbrellas on a white background. The contrasting black skirt compliments the black boarder and bow at the bust as well as the black halter straps perfectly. The back is elasticized at the top and there is a back zipper. There is also a black back tie at the waist. I got this dress in my usual size large which proved to be a great fit for my 38-31-38, 5'3" frame. I was a little worried about the length of this dress as this dress seemed to be much shorter than other Heart of Haute dresses from what I could see on the model from the Heart of Haute website as well as from what I could see on Julie Ann from the Cats Like Us website but because I'm short and only stand 5 feet and 3 inches the dress came down to just above my knees which is a good length for me! Super cute dress and just perfect for where I wore it to.... in the next blog post!!!!

Heart of Haute Matey Dress in It's Raining Cats- Front View

Heart of Haute Matey Dress in It's Raining Cats- Side View

Heart of Haute Matey Dress in It's Raining Cats- Back View

C.C. Cookie Says She Wants To Play Too!

Outdoor Spring Tea

Spring has sprung and seems to have flown by!

But before Spring leaves for the year I wanted to be sure to celebrate the warm days with an outdoor tea with friends! For the occasion I invited friends Wendy and Betty over and set the kettle on the burner!

For this tea I used my Lenox Butterfly tea set which seemed very fitting for a spring tea.

On the menu was peppered turkey tea sandwiches with honey mustard and avocado, white egg salad sandwiches with chives and lime mayonnaise, and ham and swiss tea sandwiches with kalamata olives and pickled bell peppers to start. The second course was mushroom turnovers, spanakopita with spinach, ricotta, and feta, and savory pastry bites with feta and caramelized onions. For desert we each got a mini fruit tart, a choice between raspberry cheesecake, vanilla bean cheesecake, or chocolate cheesecake, as well as a choice between pistachio macaron, key lime macaron, and raspberry macaron. For tea selections I had a green blooming tea with jasmine, as well as a decaf sweet coconut thai chai tea.

The tea and tea sandwiches I made myself. The savories I got from Trader Joe's. And the desserts I picked up from Whole Foods. 

A Nice Day To Spend In the Warm Sun With Friends Over Tea.

Happy Belated Double Kitty Birthday Party!

Un tres joyuex anniversaire pour mes chats!

Which means a very happy birthday for my cats. Not too shabby for remembering all that high school French!

My dad started the tradition in our house of celebrating Murkurie's birthday when she turned 1 back in 1996. I still remember the Cold Stone ice cream cake he got her. There's a picture somewhere of it with me with a very bad home-made haircut having to hold Merk off the table by the cake otherwise she would have really just gone for that cake! She did get a slice of it but just a little bit. There was a lot of forgotten birthdays between then and the last couple years but I'm happy that for the last couple of years we have not forgotten to give her some kind of birthday bash!

This year we celebrated late and decided to celebrate with a double birthday since both Merk and Wolfgang have birthdays in April and it was now May. I am also late in posting this blog... This happened during the first weekend of May.

Getting the Party Ready! Kitty Tea Cups of Cat Sip, Kitty Tea Pots, and Birthday Cakes!

A Cake For Murkurie and a Cake For Wolfgang

For Merk's birthday I got her a single layer white cake with lots of pink and lots of icing. She likes icing!
For Wolf, I got him a tiramisu. I don't think he really cares for cake so I picked out one I like ;)

We invited all the house cats to come so I set up four cups and saucers of Cat Sip but unfortunatly only two cats showed up. Wolf was a no show for his own birthday party! And I didn't really expect B.K. to come since she's feral and all but I thought it would be nice to invite her.

Murkurie Inspecting the Kitty Birthday Cakes

Merk Likes Her Cake Most

Cats Having Fun At the Double Kitty Birthday Party

C.C. Cookie Also Wants to Inspect the Kitty Birthday Cakes

Action Shot! Kitties Having Fun!

Candles Are Lit!

Merk Is a Bit of a Pyromaniac

Watch Out Merk!

Happy 19th Birthday Murkurie! Happy 2nd Birthday Wolfgang!

Happy 19th birthday Murkurie! Happy 2nd birthday Wolfgang! Wishing you good health, lots of good comfy warm cat naps, lots of chicken treats and cracker treats, and wishing you many more happy kitty birthdays to come!

Hell Bunny's Emilie Dress, A Dress Review

Hell Bunny's been making quite an impression on me these last two seasons.

Actually, make that last two years.

While I've always admired their signature 1950's style halter dresses from the last couple of years, I'm really excited to see the new styles they have been coming out with lately. Last Fall/Winter (2013) they came out with beautiful 40's style dresses (the Mae West dress, the Nell dress, as well as the Madden dress). The Fall/Winter before that (2012) their styles were also equally impressive with their Suzy Parker dress, Posey dress, Evie dress, and Sandy dress. And they haven't been limiting themselves to awesome dresses only for the cooler months. Last Spring/Summer (2013) they had the awesome Melanie dress, and the Lazy River dress. This Spring/Summer (2014) they have the beautiful Sheila dress, and Claudia dress previously reviewed respectively here (An Apple a Day, The Vintage Dancer Dress, A.K.A. Hell Bunny's Clauida Dress ). These are just a few of my favorites from this brand. One more to add to the list is their Emilie dress. I got this dress from JBR Clothing.

I can't quite put my finger on this dress... is it 1930's style? 1940's style? Maybe 50's or 60's? Whatever style it may be emulating, it's a beautiful dress. I'm kind of leaning towards 30's (judging from the length, the crochet collar, and the pleating style) but I could be wrong. It could as easily be seen as 1960's style. In any case, I will continue on to the details.

This dress is made from a cotton spandex blend but seems to be as easy care as polyester, not wrinkling easily. It has a heavier weight which makes it a good dress for any season with the right accessories. With a pair of sweater tights and a good cardigan I can see this easily being one of my go-to winter dresses though, the cap sleeves ensures it would also be a great summer dress when worn without a cardigan or tights. The material of the dress, although on the heavier side, has a slight stretch to it as well as a somewhat soft feel to it rather than thick and starchy, making it a very comfortable and easy to wear dress. The dress has a full circle skirt, giving it lots of twirl. There is pleating under the bustline around its tailored cut. This is balanced out with clean, simple, cap sleeves. The dress is adorned with a cream colored crocheted collar as well as pearl buttons down the collar which themselves are adorned with gold.

As many dresses as I have I don't really have too many black dresses, especially swing-skirted black dresses. So it's nice to add this little black dress to my collection, particularly an easy to wear one!

Hell Bunny Emilie Dress- Front View

Hell Bunny Emilie Dress- Side View

Hell Bunny Emilie Dress- Back View

Hell Bunny Emilie Dress-Close Up of Collar and Button Detail

Hell Bunny Emilie Dress- Close Up of Bustline Detail, Pleats, Buttons and Collar

It is so hard to photograph black! The pleated detail of the dress does not come out too well in the pictures. It has a lovely cut on top though.

One thing that does drive me a little crazy about this dress is the buttons. The backs of these buttons aren't flat but more like U shape which do nothing to stop the buttons from moving around. Does anyone have any suggestions to keep these buttons still!?

Making Little Hats AKA a DIY Tutorial on Fascinators

I am so excited about the new little hat I made over the weekend!

I've slowly been compiling quite a collection of hats, fascinators, hair flowers, and hair bows. It was within this obsessive frame of mind that I saw Trashy Diva's blog post on their new fascinator collection by Louise Green, Fascinator Frenzy. These hats and fascinators were so whimsy, cheerful, colorful and just so fun!!! I was dying to get my hands on the Louise Green Cherry Doll Hat! But then I saw the price. :( As much as I do spend my money I just couldn't take the plunge. And so I was sadly resigned to the fact that I did not and will not own the Louise Green Cherry Doll Hat. But that doesn't mean I would have to go without some whimsy, cheerful, colorful and fun little hats and fascinators of my very own. I decided to make my own. And here friends is my DIY tutorial on the new fun little hat I made over the weekend.


1) Start with a fascinator base. I bought this teardrop sinamay from seller guigkat on ebay. I have also seen similar fascinator bases on etsy.

(My trusty bff Murkurie overlooks my work.)

2) If your fascinator base doesn't already have a hair comb, alligator clip, snap clip, headband, elastic string, or neck tie (some kind of way to keep the hat on) you will have to get one of these items.

For this fascinator I decided to utilize a hair comb because the base itself is not too flexible so a snap clip probably wouldn't be too practical, I didn't know how well an alligator clip glued on to this somewhat nonporous surface of the hat would hold, and I didn't want to have the visibility of a headband, elastic string, or neck tie on this particular hat. 

3) I sewed on the hair clip to the back of the fascinator sewing around the base of the hair clip between the last two teeth on each edge of the comb. 

4) Next... things to put on the hat! For this hat, in the spirit of the Louise Green Cherry Doll Hat, I wanted to make something with fake fruit. I decided to make a grape fascinator!

5) And yet, while I was out gathering my grapes I saw this peacock feather in the same aisle. I thought, how lovely these colors go together! And you may know from my other past posts, A Good Peacock is Hard to Find, and  A Peacock for All Occasions, how much I do love peacocks!

6) I hot glued the peacock feather about halfway down the fascinator and at a jaunty little angle to give the hat some asymmetry, gluing the feather at about the eye of the feather and also at the base of the feather.

7) Then I sewed the feather on for extra reinforcement at the base of the feather.

8) Next I added the grapes. These I sewed on as well sewing around the stems of the grapes at the top middle of the bunch and also at the end of the bunch. I knew I wanted to have some of the grape leaves on with the bunch but the grape leaves that came with this bunch was super rubbery looking and not to my liking....

9) So I took a leaf off of my artificial grape vine in my house and hot glued that on to my fascinator!

10) And voila! My very own whimsy, cheerful, colorful, and fun grape fascinator!