EFRC Charity Auction

Last Saturday was the annual charity auction for the Exotic Feline Rescue Center. There were a LOT more people there this year than last, which was great for the cats but not so good for Izzy. We didn't have a table to sit at, so we ended up holding her in some fashion for the entire 3 hours that we were there. At the end, we tried to let her down a few times, and here's what she did:

Yeah....it wasn't going so well. It would've been a lot better if I had my sling, but I forgot it.



The only time she perked up was when Missie got her a balloon.



We had a good time at the auction, and I came away with a couple of goodies for myself:


After the auction, we went out to dinner with our friends, Brad and Missie. izzy was a pretty good sport through most of it (eating crayons, throwing spoons...you know, the usual). Luckily, Missie and Brad brought Izzy's Christmas present, and she was SUPER happy with it!

EFRC Pumpkin Party

This past Saturday, we went to the annual Exotic Feline Rescue Center (EFRC) Pumpkin Party. For anyone that follows this blog, you may remember me posting about it last year right here. Last year, they estimated that there were 200 people attending.....this year there were 400! Great for the EFRC, since they are funded solely by donations and events like this...bad for us because we were at the back of the tour. Luckily we have seen it before.

Here's a great shot that Joacim got of the tiger jumping out of the water...

I was so curious to see how Izzy would react to the kitties. At first, she was curious, pointing to them and going "rar rar" (which is Izzy-speak for "Roar", as that's what we teach her that tigers and lions say). Anyway, all was fine and well until we got to the lioness enclosure. There is a definite pecking order there, and the ladies were squabbling, making all sorts of noise. I've got some cool video of it on my sister's camera, so as soon as she uploads them I'll post them. You can get a really good idea of how primal they are. I thought it was sooo cool....Izzy did not, and I ended up carrying her in the same sling as last year (great that she can still fit in it!)

Another great shot!

They're just so beautiful....

And comical....

She was fine once we got away from the cats

Here's Izzy with my sister and niece, Taylor. She (my niece) and my nephew, JT, spent the night at our house the previous night, and it was a lot of fun. Unfortunately, I didn't get any photos of it.

This here is George. Joacim adopted George in Izzy's name at the EFRC charity auction earlier this year. The money goes to getting George and his roommates a bigger encloser. He's a beautiful cat too, and I kinda like to think that he's posing for me here.

And here's a family portrait taken by my friend, Missie. Thanks Missie!!! (and yes, my face is enormous...I know...steroids are a bitch.)

sleep travels, EFRC charity, new jungle toy

Well, we've discovered one thing that little Miss Izzyboo has inherited from me (besides the crazy big hair), STINKY FEET! :O WOW! I even made sure to clean between each one of her tiny little toes, and to no avail!!! Ah well..at least she gets it honestly :)

So Izzy's been travelling in her sleep..by that I mean, we start her off in the middle, and who knows what position she's going to be in when I go and get her in the morning (if she's kind enough to bless us with an uninterrupted night's sleep!). Anyway, last week, this is what I saw when I walked in:

\
Yes, that's her feet hanging outside of the crib. This was too cute for me not to take a picture of!

Izzy's been eating really really well lately, and we've been trying new things here and there. I know that bananas are her favorite baby food, so I thought I'd try giving her a "real" banana. I got these little food holders with a mesh pocket that you can put real food in. It allows the baby to suck on the food, getting the Guess she wasn't quite ready for that, so I asked some of my friends, and they suggested the biter biscuits...just to get her used to feeding herself. And they were a success, as the following photos show:





These biscuit things are really messy, but she seemed to really like them, so who cares about the mess! I'll just make sure to give her one of these on bath night!

This past Saturday, the 3 of us went to a charity event for the Exotic Feline Rescue Center. You may remember our first visit there, detailed in this post. We are huge fans of what this center does, and wanted to do our part to help the cats. They had both a silent and a live auction, and we were fortunate enough to win something in the silent auction. It was a basket full of wildlife goodies for Izzy. Our friends, Miss and Brad, were winners in the silent AND live auction too! Here's a couple of photos:



And Joacim did an absolutely AMAZING thing....he adopted an animal as a gift to Izzyboo! Wow! What a wonderful thing to do. The money that Joacim donated will go toward giving George (that's Izzy's leopard) a bigger enclosure at the center. He's been thinking about this for quite awhile, and I'm happy for him that he was able to do this. I think he felt pretty good about it! Here's a photo of Joacim showing Izzy her new leopard!



I'm sensing that she's thinking about getting ready to crawl..or she's at least tired of being in one spot now. She's simply not satisfied with sitting on the floor by herself anymore, so of course, I got her a new toy. I was hoping that this could be something that might motivate her to want to move around and see the other side, and I'm sure it probably will in the future. Right now, she's not too sure about it, but she looked pretty happy in this photo:


If anyone has any good tips/suggestions for toys to get her, please please please leave a comment or email. I can't reply to comments (haven't figured that out in this blog host yet), but leave your email address if I don't have it and I'll get back to you.

I went on a picture-taking rampage this afternoon. I'd love to post some photos, 'cause I think I've got some good ones, but I'm not done with them yet, so you'll have to wait. I'm still figuring out my photo software...In the meantime, here's a cute one of her. I love this look on her face everytime she gives it to me (probably won't be saying that when she's older, but she can get away with it now :)...



Oh, and here's one of Izzy trying out the sippy cup. They started working with her at daycare, so I thought I'd help the cause. I put some juice in it, because I found out this weekend that she LOVES juice. She doesn't really drink very much during the day with me, so I wanted to figure out SOME way to get some liquid in her, and lucky enough she loves it.


Well, that's about it for this week's post...unless I get those photos done that I took today. Keep an eye out!

All video post

For a change, I thought I'd make this post all videos....

Remember our trip to the Exotic Feline Rescue Center, and the video of the charging tiger??? Well, here it is:



And here's Izzy sitting up all by herself


And here's a very happy, awake Izzy


And here's another very awake Izzy WAYYYYYY past her bedtime...


Here's a little video of our first feeding adventure...


And here's little Boo taking a nosedive in the tub!

Exotic Feline Rescue Center

Joacim, Izzy, my nephew JT and I went to the Exotic Feline Rescue Center on Saturday. It's located near Center Point, which is about an hour west of Indianapolis. This is a wonderful place that takes cats that were neglect or abused, or confiscated by officials. The sad thing is that for every 1 cat they take in, they have to turn down about 40. It costs around $20,000 for one enclosure, and depending on the situtation the cats were brought in depends on if they can be socialized with other cats. The center gets all of it's funding from gate receipts and merchandising, and everyone that works there is a volunteer. The owner of the property, Joe, even rents out a room in his house where you can get up close and personal with the cats. Sounds like quite an adventure. It's a wonderful place, and I encourage anyone that wants to learn more to either go there for a visit, or at the least check out their website.

The center was having a pumpkin party for the kitties, where you could bring your Jack-o-Lantern to give to the cats to play with. We didn't bring a pumpking with us (we didn't get any pumpkins this year :( ) but we were very excited to see them.

This post will have lots of photos...hope you all enjoy them!


Here's the wagon full of Jack-o-Lanterns. They put meat inside the pumpkins to entice the cats.


This tiger is protecting his pumpkin


This lioness was enjoying the fun and the weather (which was BEAUTIFUL!!!)


This lion reminded me A LOT of my cat, Chopper. There's no way you could call this kitty "underfed" :)


These lions were in this position everytime we came around their enclosure, which ended up being 4 different times. Doesn't look like too bad of a life for them now, eh?


Here's Joacim, Izzy and JT watching an enclosure


This is a beautiful, majestic cat (although a tad bit grumpy)


Here's our friend Missy with Izzy. Izzy had a great time with her, right Missy :)


This tiger was one in a group of tigers was the most fun to watch. They were so playful! I have a video of this tiger that is a lot of fun to watch, but I'm having some issues uploading it, so whenever I get it done, I'll post it.


This kitty was also fond of jumping on the fence and having his picture taken


This cat was stalking my nephew. That was one of the coolest things to observe...there were several cats that seemed to be very interested in my nephew. It's as if they were able to pick the weakest one out of the bunch, and their sights were set on JT. This photo was taken while the kitty was looking at JT.


Here's Izzy and me...the stroller wasn't going to work very well in the terrain, so we used the sling.


And here's Izzy sucking on her toes. I got a little tired from carrying her, and she was getting so warm, that I took her socks off. She had a great time grabbing them and putting them in her mouth :)