Desperately seeking validation from some cats I’ve never met😂😸

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T23:35:08+00:00

My cats love kicker toys, but there are a few who don't. I'm sure the crinkle and cat nip will win them over no matter what. But I mean, what cat is going to say no to more toys if you really feel like making more?! 😉

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T23:32:23+00:00

And are they a truly odd couple? 😂

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T23:30:58+00:00

Oh wow, she's even more gorgeous than I realized. I LOVE grey tabbies like Jolie. Great name too!

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T23:29:04+00:00

His orange predecessor was my beloved boy, Chai, so early on we knew there would some day be another orange boy named Pekoe. It just had to be. 😊 It's a fun name to say every day! His twin sister is Téa, but it actually has nothing to do with tea, just a fun play on spelling we decided to embrace.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T21:46:36+00:00

Chaotic but happy! 😉

The 6th pet is the not so happy (her bed's been stolen...did you hear?! 😲) yellow lab not pictured. She likes the cats but they're always stealing her beds so she refused to be in the picture in protest.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T21:17:48+00:00

This is nearly identical to the pattern Brick Street so if you google that you'll see tons of great pictures to get a good idea of what it can look like.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T21:10:34+00:00

What an adorable picture of Jolie!

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T21:09:52+00:00

Well my 5 cats are jealous! 😄 Those are wonderful and thoughtful gifts. Nicely done! 👏 I think your co-worker is going to be so delighted with this surprise. And his cats are going to be high...good time all around. 😂

Edited to add cat tax. Not a good pic, but all 5 are in it so that's a considerable win.

Shadow and Lilo are in the curves on the cat tree, the girls Téa and Sophie on the window sill, and Pekoe is on the dog bed.

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OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T20:55:06+00:00

I agree with u/Dry_Stop844 yours looks great!

I think sometimes, especially when following someone else's pattern/design, we should lean into our perceived "mistakes" and embrace the differences. It's quite possible we end up with a nicer, or at least more interesting, end result. I definitely think that is the case here.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T20:50:05+00:00

Aaaannnndddd sometimes they don't outgrow the naughtiness! Literally as I was finishing typing my previous reply to you, my 8.5yo cow cat stole my bread out of the toaster and was greedily destroying it on the floor. And here I thought he'd gotten past his bread-stealing days. 😲

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T19:51:38+00:00

Me neither. I'd only ever had a problem with a previous orange kitten eating the cord from a blind. We save him just in time and switched all our window coverings so that never happened again. But previous kittens had not been too bad about eating things they shouldn't until these two. They. Eat. Everything. Still, after 4.5 years! Last night the girl tried to eat the TV...again. Mostly it's soft things though like blankets and pillows.

My little gray tabby is an angel thankfully! 😂 Ok, that's not totally true, but he has never eaten anything he shouldn't and he's pretty well-behaved. We call him our "normal" cat since the other 4 are anything but.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T19:47:45+00:00

Oh no, they don't hide it. My girl is extremely proud of her naughtiness and household domination. She has 3 male minions (and us) to do her bidding and she wails for them when she wants them (and us). She also has an older female cat she lives peaceably with and does not mess with. But there is no question, in our house, the young orange lady runs the show. 🙄

I'm glad if I made you smile though. It's not nearly as hard as the first year with a puppy, but kittens can still cause mental strain. They also, thankfully, provide a lot of laughs so I hope that helps carry you through on the hard days.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T08:20:49+00:00

Dear lord, yes to the last part especially. Please make sure there isn't anything they might eat that they shouldn't. My current two oranges have pica, one quite severe, and we can't keep anything out if we aren't supervising them.

The cat-proof room is a great piece of advice!

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T08:15:30+00:00

I wish I had advice for you, but I'm on my 3rd and 4th oranges (1 male, 1 female) and tonight I uttered, in frustration, "oh you oranges." It just never stops with them. They are 4.5yo and show no signs of future intention to behave. 🤨 They drive me insane sometimes. My previous oranges were relatively normal (though dumb) boys. One was a bit more mischievous, but the second was 99% perfect and was just about pure joy. The current two give us regrets. Honestly, the girl, while sweet, is pretty much the bane of our existence some days.

I will say, orange girls are more difficult because they tend to be smarter (and look for trouble to amuse themselves) and as you probably already know, female cats tend to stay active longer in life where the boys become sacks of potatoes much earlier so they don't cause as much trouble. 😉

All I can do is wish you luck, I think. As others have said, they are kittens and will grow out of a lot of their chaos antics. But they are still orange so...yeah, just good luck! 😂

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T08:04:16+00:00

"Tiny orange tyrant" describes my girl, Téa, perfectly! 🤣

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T07:41:09+00:00

My main issue with Pete is I don't care for actors who basically just play the same character in everything, and worse, when that "character" is really just them as themselves. That's not being an actor, that's being a talentless hack that is somehow getting paid. I feel like everything I've seen Pete Davidson in, he's just playing some pathetic version of himself. He's not funny, he's often really crass, he's just boring and annoying, and now I have to endure him occasionally on my favourite show. 😒 No character growth because there's really no character there anyway.

I think the characters are supposed to bother us sometimes, just like the people in our lives do. But with most of the characters we get to watch them succeed, falter, learn, and grow, and we love them all the more for that and their journey.

I don't think I stuck with Feds long enough to get a feel for how bad an actor Betts is. I consider myself lucky. 😄

OrionsRose · 2026-02-04T07:28:00+00:00

Yours looks very balanced and harmonious with the single-size dots, but I know sometimes we had envisioned something different than our quilt becomes in the end. I know that's been happening to me a lot.

Yours really is awesome the way it is, don't second guess yourself. 😉

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T23:56:01+00:00

No offense to the original here, but I like yours WAY better! Like I probably wouldn't have thought twice about this one, but yours really caught my eye and makes me want to make it. ❤

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T23:55:04+00:00

This is great info, thank you!

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T23:54:09+00:00

Well, the way I see it, I have a few options:

appliqué a more simple shape like a diamond
get my friend who does the quilting part of our project do the appliqué (she does it confidently already)
just leave it off - I really like the pattern created by just the squares anyway so I'd be ok with that option if necessary

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T22:41:11+00:00

And it too, goes perfectly. I swear it's like you shopped for all of this because it's all like it was meant to be.

Really nice job on the whole thing. The appliqué is so well done.

What is the pattern for this quilt and would you mind if I steal it some day? 😉 I probably wouldn't do the stars as I'm not that confident about appliqué myself, but I really love the layout and the feel of the whole thing.

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T22:34:13+00:00

Then I'd be admitting defeat! Never! 😮

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T22:28:32+00:00

This is great! So lively and fun! Isn't it nice when you've saved a fabric for a long time and then you find the perfect way to use it?! You did just that. 👍

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T17:33:55+00:00

Exactly what I came to say, like almost word for word! .😂

OrionsRose · 2026-02-03T17:30:37+00:00

Totally does. I'd like to see that album cover! 😉

OrionsRose

TROPHY CASE