Looking for Love

Our foster guinea pig from Dakin is still looking for a forever home.  He's gotten into the spirit for February and took out a personal ad:

Single older male, seeking long term relationship.  I love cuddles in front of the TV and gourmet dining (strictly vegan).  I'm low maintenance, enjoying the basics in life, like hay, pellets, and a brown paper lunch bag.  I'm a sucker for veggies of all kinds, except for cilantro.  In return for affection (and treats) I will be steadfastly loyal and will occasionally sing you the song of my people (at full volume).  

Winter Scenes

 

Doesn't Orion look cute all bundled up for winter?  Dakin Humane was looking for photos of our foster guinea pig, so we pulled together a quick photo shoot on the one day all week that had sunshine.

I swear he's smiling in that photo. 

Echo Fall Photos

Echo endured a photo shoot.  We needed some glam-shots for her adoption page at Dakin Humane.  

She was a little unsure of her surroundings.  A little red pepper was enough to keep her facing the camera rather than hiding behind the pumpkin. 

Crispy Christmas (Sixteen Days Old)

 

The Rice Crispy Boys!  Back for one last hurrah.  They must be big boys now in their forever homes.  But look at how cute they were at sixteen days old when I took these photos last March.  

Snap takes up more room in that box than he did in the prior photo shoot. 

Crispy Christmas (Nine Days Old)

 

Do you recall the Rice Crispy boys from last spring?  We did a couple of photo shoots with my little coffee cups.  Adorable!  But what is as good as baby guinea pigs in tiny cups?  Baby guinea pigs in Christmas wrapping.  So we had a little Christmas in March!

They were only nine days old for this photo shoot.  So tiny! 

Hmm... how tasty is that box?

Powerpuff Girls Fall Photo Shoot

Meet my latest foster guinea pigs from Dakin Humane.  Bubbles, Buttercup and Blossom have settled in quite nicely in the last week.  They were pretty freaked out the first day, but by dinner time they were wheeking for lettuce.  These gals are seriously tuned in to paper pags and kitchen noises.  They go nuts whenever Rob crinkles a bag (for whatever reason they react to him more than me).

Bye Bye Babies

One last post of the Rice Crispy boys:  the trio of guinea pig baby fosters from Dakin Humane.

The morning that Crackle and Laylla went to back to Dakin I found the three boys stuffed into the tunnel.  I was sorry to break them up, but I was thrilled that the two singletons (Laylla and Crackle) were going to a new home to live with another guinea pig.  

Laylla was very curious when she went in the carrier.  Crackle was hiding behind her.  So at least they got the drive back to Dakin together.

Growing Boys

We've enjoyed another week of antics with our three baby foster guinea pigs, Snap, Crackle and Pop.  They're growing up so fast!

We did another photo shoot with the boys over the weekend.  I wanted some more coffee cup photos as well as some "head shots" for their Dakin adoption page.  It took several minutes before they boys finally sat still.  Good grief, they're adorable.  

The amazing thing is how much they've grown in one week.  They pretty much tripled in size since they were born.  Wow!  They jump up and down to the second level with ease.  They move so fast it looks like they magically transport themselves from one floor to the next.

Tempest in a Teapot

Or maybe I should say chaos in coffee cups?  We decided to have a little photo shoot with Snap, Crackle and Pop for some glamor shots for their adoption write ups.  I decided it might be easier if they were contained in something.  So I put them in my little coffee cups.  What do you think?

Are they cute or what?

A Short Stay

Our two guinea pig foster boys from Dakin didn't stay long.  They were just getting getting into the swing of things around the house.  Lots of wheeking.  Not a lot of begging.  They had strange names:  Boov and Oh! (yes, including the exclamation point).  Boov hid most of the time but was a good boy when picked up and snuggled.  Oh! was very excitable, made most of the noise of the two.  He had no fear and loved running laps.

Spring Cheese

Dakin asked for some St Patrick's Day or spring photos of my two foster boys, Bleu and Provolone.  I don't have any shamrock stuff, but I do have plenty of fake flowers.  I threw flowers on the table top, grabbed some cilantro and strawberry tops, plunked the boys down and this is what happened.

Pretty cute, aren't they?

Fostering Mark

Our foster guinea pig, Mark, is still hanging out with us.  He's become very familiar with our routine - when I get up in the morning, when we go to the kitchen.  His most interesting time to wheek at us is just as a show that we're watching has ended.  I'm not sure if it's the end credits, or the sounds of the TV or how we move, but he'll start wheeking for treats before we even get up from the couch!

However, his longish stay with us landed him as our subject for the annual holiday photo shoot.

I Like Thursday: Foolish Piggy, Finished Flimsies and Fabric

Not a lot of photos for this week's likes.  But I'll start out with the cute ones!  

The Dakin shelter emailed to say they have over 38 guinea pigs in care, most of them in foster.  They're looking for fun photos to post online, so we did a quick shoot with Mark.

Brownie and Twix

For some reason I thought our latest fosters, Brownie and Twix, were going to be girls.  Rob brought them home on Friday and I quickly realized how wrong I was.  These two are good, solid adult boars.  Brownie and Twix settled in fairly quickly - other than a screaming humpfest on Saturday morning as they re-established themselves.  (I really wish I had videoed that - it was impressive.)  After that, they turned down the volume to the normal rumblestrutting and grousing over who got the hammock or the paper bag.

On Monday I did a short session of pig torture:  a photo shoot.  I'll have next year's cards all set to go!  They were really good boys.  We started off with pandemonium as they scrambled all over the set trying to get away.  But then they found the bits of carrot and lettuce and decided this might not be so bad.  They didn't mind getting dressed up, although we got more photos of the hats falling off their heads than with them on.

Scarlet in Fall Colors

Scarlet is our latest foster guinea pig from Dakin.  Isn't she a cutie?  Such soft fur.  She's still a little bony, but curious and seems quite happy.  She hides sometimes, but every day I see her in a different part of the cage.  Scarlet gets very wheeky when we're in the kitchen.

She eats her hay like it's going out of style.  Still cautious with veggies - loves lettuce and radish leaves.  Carrots now pass approval, along with parsley.  Not so sure about bell pepper yet.  The blackberry was a hit - but I'm not willing to share more of them!

Foster Christmas Photos

Gasp!  Could it be?  A holiday guinea pig photo shoot??

Absolutely!

I honestly thought after Mabel passed that we wouldn't do another holiday card photo shoot.  However, we had two adorable foster guinea pigs this Thanksgiving, so we decided to keep the tradition alive.  Last Sunday was wonderfully sunny, so I dug out decorations and we wrangled us some guinea pigs.

Mango and Panda are seriously energetic and were tough to corral.  I had to keep the treats coming to get them to sit still.  Bolting off the table was not allowed!

Golden Orrery Redux

When Golden Orrery was in the planning stages, I was going to have it finished before the autumn fairs.  Then life intervened; I finished it just in time for Christmas.  In those blissful days before 2020, I planned to submit in this year's fairs... and obviously that's not going to happen. 

Plan B:  submit it online.  But the original photos were taken off our front porch, not a blank, uncluttered background that online competitions require.  So the search was on for a well lit, uniform background that could handle a nine-foot tall quilt.  That was a tall order (pun intended).  I received several offers and suggestions including contacting Greenfield Community College's art department (they were very nice, but unable to help at this time), photoshoping the original photos (thank you!) and an unexpected offer to hang it off the side of a friend's house (which was looking pretty good).

But then, Rob located a possible wall at the UMass Amherst campus.  Let the adventure begin....

Thinking of Spring

Wedgwood is sure spring is in the air.  Can't you smell it??

A Fun Photo Shoot

We had a long-awaited photo shoot two weeks ago with Salem Pet Photo.  Working with Joey is always a blast.  I had been worried if Wedgwood would be up for it, but she was perky and happy on that Monday (and she's still doing well!).

Are we wrapping or unwrapping?

I Like Thursday: Holiday Prep and Sewing

I love, love, love the photos of last week's session with Joey from Salem Pet Photo.  So much cuteness!  I'll be sharing more of them soon.  I got the photos in time to order Christmas cards with some of the prints.  Perfect!

Doesn't it look like Mabel is ready to catch snowflakes on her tongue? 

I liked having a week off.  Got lots done.  Still have too much to do!  Damn - can I retire yet?