Be Kind to Animals Week

Hi friends! Last week, May 4-10th, was Be Kind to Animals Week. To celebrate the occasion, I did a couple things extra nice for my pet. I'm excited about it! Let me show you.

For starters...

A new bedazzled collar!

This was a really simple craft. A extra collar, a bucket of jewels, and a tube of adhesive. All of which I just laying around the house. My out of pocket price? FREE. Score!

best glue ever!

I'm really impressed with this glue. This is my new favorite glue. It's called Welder. It's a clear gel, and the best part, NOT SMELLY! I bought it at Home Depot a couple months ago. (Some craft adhesives have a super strong chemical smell that lasts and lasts, but not this one!)

The bling is blinding me!

Here's the cat, wearing her new fancy collar! It's been a couple days since I made it, and it's still on. Nothing has fallen off. All the jewels are still in place! Yay!

Thanks for the tuna. I won't kill you just yet

Then, besides giving the cat a can of tuna, the second thing I did was plant some Cat Grass. If you have a cat, I totally recommend this! My cat has been going crazy! She loves it! You can get it here or at Walmart or your local pet store.

Throw it on some dirt. Keep it watered. 3 days later you'll have sprouts. Totally easy!

It might be just plain oat seeds, but I swear, by the way the cat's been acting, it's a little more "herbal', if you know what I mean. She has the munchies, has been all lovey-dovey, and best of all; doesn't try to bite me just for the fun of it. Lets just say planting this is the best thing I've ever done. It's cheaper than cat Valium!

I don't know about you, but I think this shot of the cat, all up in the flower pot, chowing down like nobody's business, is funny. Usually, there's a no picture taking tolerance policy in place, but somehow, I got right up in her face.. I think she was too busy to notice.

Ok, fun time is over. get back to work!

And that's it for today's pet pictures. :) Hope you did something special for your pet this week.
Hugs!
Caroline

DIY Aphid and Ant Spray

Well Hello there! Welcome friends!
Here's my take on the DIY aphid and ant spray. It works like a champ!
Can I just say, this stuff, even with my half-way attempt at following the recipe, is AMAZING!

boring everyday things CAN kill on contact! 

To save my one lone bell pepper plant, I was researching how to get rid of aphids (and subsequent ants) using alternatives to harsh chemicals. I found quite a few sites that talk about using a tomato leaf spray or a garlic oil spray. I'm sure they'll work fine. I'm just too impatient to wait the 24 hrs for the smashed cloves of garlic or the tomato leaves to steep. Plus it seemed too fussy for me.

Then I happened upon this site, and its ever-so-easy homemade insecticide spray, which is basically soap and oil in water. SOLD!

I just guessed on following their recipe. Here's what I did:

Start with a big empty spray bottle
cooking Oil: glug in enough to approximate 2 tablespoons
Soap: dribble in enough to look like 1 teaspoon, then squirt in some more just to make sure.
shake all this up to blend them together.
fill the bottle up with water.
***go have fun spraying and killing all those icky things! (shake the spray bottle occasionally since the water and oil tends to separate)

The downside is this'll kill friendly things, like ladybugs. Since my patio container garden is ladybug free, I'm okay with using this.

There was a hint of an ant trail from the patio edge to the bell pepper plant yesterday, and then today,when I checked,  it was almost a thick, black ant highway!! Yuck! They gotta go. Guess what? After dowsing the ant trail with the soap/oil spray, they all went away! And they are still gone, 5 hours later. I know that's not long, but with ants, they would've been back by now. I'll check back later on the aphid's demise. Here's hoping it wasn't too late for the bell pepper plant!
Hugs!
(I'm off to go wash my hands)
Caroline