Thankful Thursday

 

Ollie: Woofs everyone! Ollie here! I am thankful for the efforts that #1 made last week, when it was so hot, to keep me safe and cool.

Our walks were shorter than usual and very early in the morning:

And when we went to visit the horses, I was able to enjoy the pond!

Wednesday Whinnies

 

Violette: Hello, Dear Friends. Oh it was hot last week. Almost too hot to neigh properly. But we are so lucky that we have a lot of lovely shade in our field, and the coolness of the pond! We did miss #1 but Ms. L and Ms. T gave us lots of cuddles and apples, so it was OK.

#1 did come to see us on Sunday, along with woofie Ollie. One of the things she does every time she comes these days is to use her strimmer to cut down nettle for us. We love nettles, but only after they have been cut down and dried a bit. So that's a real treat ion top of the carrots and apples! As usual, The Big V tries to shove me out of the way to get the best of everything (such a gent, he is...) but I can hold my own!

Tranquil Tuesday

 

Ryū-Chan: It's me, little Dragon! As the latest arrival to the Poupounette, I decided it would be nice if I represented everyone to say a big THANK YOU for all the lovely comments about our 18th Blogoversary yesterday.

So, the heatwave has dissipated for now. Although it remains warm, the night time temps have gone down by half, and #1 has returned to sleeping in her bed rather than on the living room sofa. After all the stress of coping with the heat, we kitties are all taking it easy and enjoying our snoozies.

Here I am on the sofa:

Here is Fluff-Puff Momo in a corner of the bedroom:

And Benny The Black on the dining room table, right behind #1's laptop:

And since it is Toesday, Momo wanted to include a close-up of his perfect pink toes, complete with toehawks!

In other news, we thought we would let you know that #1 is abandoning us tomorrow. She is off to Luxembourg to visit her friend, Ms. L. She will be back on Sunday, so it won't be a long trip, and Mr. G will of course look after us perfectly! She has prepared some posts for her time away, and will try to comment but no guarantees.

Our Blogoversary - We are 18!!!

 

Today marks 18 years since our very first post appeared here. At the time, there were just two of us, plus #1; woofie Tommy and Abyssinian kitty Sen-Chan. Both were not yet a year old when they started blogging. At the time, we never imagined it would be such an adventure and so long-lasting! Over the years, we have written 6095 posts and received 93,790 comments. We have made so many friends, laughed and cried with so many, said so many hellos and goodbyes. We have seen many of our friends move away from blogging and we miss each and every single one of them.

Before we started blogging, there was just one cat, an Abyssinian called Ikkyu who was born in Japan at the time #1 lived there. He lived for 15 years, on three continents with #1 and was a very exclusive boy, and thus an only boy all his life. Even though he was gone by the time this blog started, we always like to include him:

We will celebrate the past 18 years through the 15 beautiful souls who have made it what is is over the years. We will post a single photo (in most cases) of them taken as near as possible to the time they joined the Poupounette Gang.

So let us start with the two "Founding Fathers" of the Poupounette, Sen-Chan and Tommy:

This is Sen-Chan with our neighbour woofie, Madrac. She was a wonderful auntie to both Sen-Chan and Tommy.

Queen Tama was the next to arrive as a small kitten:

And she was followed by Sei-Chan who originally came over at four weeks with her Mama, Viña des Mar, and never left:

Yuu-Chan, whom we sadly lost at 15 months, was next. He was the sweetest boy ever

We started a whole new adventure when young Vidock joined the Gang in late 2010:

Tama-Chan had a litter in late 2009. There were three boys and one girl, and one of the boys decided he was staying and grew into Da Beebs:

Even though the other three left for good homes, we wanted to post a picture of them all:

A year after we lost  Yuu-Chan, we were joined by Genji, The Shining Prince, our one and only blue Abyssinian. This was the day when #1 collected him from Orly airport in Paris:

In 2012, Violette joined the Gang after #1 decided that she had no future with her breeders. Unlike Vidock who was born a prince in a manor house, Violette had to learn what it was like to be loved and cared for. She did well!

2018 was a terrible year in which we lost Sei-Chan and Tommy, and in May 2019, we lost Da Beebs. But in late January 2019, we did welcome little Ollie to the Gang.

Then there was Covid, and we lost Genji in 2021. It wasn't until March 2021 that Benny The Black joined the Gang:

And in May 2021, Violette's Mama, Hôtesse, and her little sister, Heloise, also became fully-fledged members of The Poupounette:

Benny needed a playmate and as he was pure black, we thought it would be fun to have a white cat too. We didn't expect Momo-Chan, who arrived in June 2022, to turn into such a Fluff Pufff!

As you will surmise from many of these photos, #1 loves Abyssinian cats, and she had been dreaming of having one more kitten, after the loss of Genji in the spring of 2021. So, when an unexpected opportunity arose in July 2023, we were delighted to welcome little Ryū-Chan, our very own dragon, among us!

And that, in a nutshell, is the list of all the beautiful souls who have made The Poupounette into what it is. We are already looking forward to welcoming little Noura, pulled from the rubble of a bombed building in Beirut, in our midst in September or October. The adventure continues!

Thank you, Dear Friends, for being our friends, smiling with us, crying with us, and opening the doors to your hearts to us.

Snuggles on Sunday

 

Benny: Hello everyone! Benny The Black here with our weekly dose of love. As you know, it has been a challenging week for us with the terrible heatwave, but the temps have started to go down and we are so thankful for that. 

Heat or no heat, it is my duty to look after my little Fluff Puff of a brother, Momo:

I also love hanging out with my woofie bro, Ollie:

As does Momo:

Dragon Ryū has been sticking close to #1 during the heatwave:

Sometimes, it can get quite crowded on #1's lap!

#1 was not able to visit the horses last week, but she is going today and we shall hopefully have some fresh photos of them soon!

Wishing you a snuggly (and cool!) Sunday!

Stultifying Saturday

 

Ollie: Woofs, everyone. Ollie here. I imagine you're getting a bit tired of our endless moaning about the weather? I'm glad to say that, with a bit of luck, this will be it for this round as temps are scheduled to start dropping from tomorrow.

Thursday night was a real scorcher and, at around 1am, we started hearing rumblings and seeing lightning. I am not scared of thunderboomies, and neither are the kitties, but I thought #1 might be. So, I decided I needed to get as close to her as possible. I am not sure exactly why, but she did not seem to appreciate the kind gesture very much. She was muttering about the couch being too narrow and endless panting on my part. I was just trying to help!

Fightin' Friday

 

Momo-Chan: Well, not REALLY fighting! My Dragon bro and I do love a good tussle on a regular basis, and we are both bored with this heatwave!

By the way, those terracotta tiles are amazing because they always stay cool, so they're great when it's hot like this!