PhotoHunt Theme: Small

The theme this week is small
and I immediately thought of how cute Willow was
when she was small.
She was only 4 months old
when I took this picture of her by my purse. Well, since I never throw anything away,
I still have that purse.
I took a picture of Willow with the purse this morning.
Clearly, she is no longer small! And here's a bonus picture of Willow at 3 months old
when I first brought her home.
She didn't even have a name yet!

Glow in the Dark Cats???

I saw this today on the Yahoo Home Page.
The cats are cute but this is
pretty weird, I think...

SEOUL (AFP) - South Korean scientists have cloned cats by manipulating a fluorescent protein gene, a procedure which could help develop treatments for human genetic diseases, officials said Wednesday. In a side-effect, the cloned cats glow in the dark when exposed to ultraviolet beams.

A team of scientists led by Kong Il-keun, a cloning expert at Gyeongsang National University, produced three cats possessing altered fluorescence protein (RFP) genes, the Ministry of Science and Technology said.

"It marked the first time in the world that cats with RFP genes have been cloned," the ministry said in a statement.

"The ability to produce cloned cats with the manipulated genes is significant as it could be used for developing treatments for genetic diseases and for reproducing model (cloned) animals suffering from the same diseases as humans," it added.

RAMS GAME DAY 13: Rams @ Bengals

UPDATE: Bengals W19 - Rams L10

at It looks like it might be a tough game with the weather in Cincinnati today!
GO RAMS!!!

PhotoHunt Theme: Long

The theme this week was "long"
and I tried to keep thinking "long" when I was out.
It paid off.
Last weekend we went downtown
to see the Blues play the Blackhawks.
They were playing on a long sheet of ice
a long way down from us! We parked at Union Station and once you are inside,
you can see that it is a very long room
where we enjoyed some cocktails! And then it was a very long hallway back to our hotel room.

Biscuit, Carmen and St. Nicholas

Today is St. Nicholas Day. It is celebrated in many countries. The real story of Santa Claus began with a real man named Nicholas born in the third century in a Greek village called Patara. He had wealthy parents and they raised him as a devout Christian. Unfortunately both his parents died in an epidemic when he was still young. Fortunately for the poor, Nicholas used his inheritance to help the needy, the sick and the suffering. He dedicated his life to God and soon became the Bishop of Myra. He was known for his generosity to those in need, his love for children and his concern for sailors and ships. Nicholas ended up suffering for his faith and was exiled and put in prison. After his release from prison he continued his good works until he died December 6th, AD 343 and the anniversary of his death became our celebration of St. Nicholas Day.
~~~~~
One story of St. Nicholas led to the custom of him being a gift giver. Mysteriously bags of gold or gold balls were tossed into some windows to provide dowries, landing in the shoes that were left by the fire to dry. So now on St. Nicholas Day, children leave out shoes or stockings hoping for some gifts from St. Nicholas, which is not unlike our Santa Claus custom with stockings.
~~~~~
Now, I think that if St. Nicholas liked children, he surely liked dogs also. These two are Carmen and Biscuit. They are my in-laws dogs and Biscuit has been featured here before. Carmen is new to the family this year and the two of them are so cute together.
~~~~~
I took these pictures at Thanksgiving and you can see that such good dogs
will definitely be getting some treats... or maybe some golden colored balls to play with. Until then, they have a lot of fun playing together!
I did take quite a few more of these pictures while they were playing,
but they were moving around way too fast to get clear photos!
Hopefully, I will do better at Christmas!

RAMS GAME DAY 12: Falcons @ Rams

UPDATE: Rams W28 - Falcons L16
Hooray we finally won one at home in the Dome!

at The game did not sell out, so no show on TV.
We were offered 2 tickets, but couldn't go.
GO RAMS!!!!!

PhotoHunt Theme: Red

The theme this week is RED and I thought of Christmas red.
Willow was featured on my Christmas Cards last year
playing with my husband's red corvette ornament
while sitting on a red tree skirt. And last Christmas I wrapped all of the 2007 calendars
in mostly red paper,
which the cats were waiting to give out.