I caught a picture of our cat the other day, sleeping through a warm, Spring afternoon.

This cat has it good.  He has acres of pasture to roam for food, and frequently will be seen having caught rabbits, birds, rats, and mice.  He frequently brings whatever bounty he has caught (or what’s left of it) and places it in the garage where I will be sure to notice it. 

In addition, he gets fed regularly just in case he does not feel like hunting for his own food.

He sleeps whenever he wants, he wanders wherever he chooses, and about the only thing he does complain about is a frequent whining to be picked up and loved.

What a life.  It reminds me of a sobering truth, however.  There are many fat cats out there today who name the name of Christ but live nothing like a Christian.  Instead, they are like our cat, who takes in frequently and rarely gives anything back, whose desire for anything in life is self-directed.

That’s not what we should be about.  We should give liberally, take in only when necessary, and all our desires in life should be God-directed.

Learn the lesson of the fat cat.

As far back as I can remember my family owned dogs.  Some little, some big, some ugly, some beautiful, all loved by me as I have always liked our four-footed friends.

We have a dog who is a faithful friend.  She has good life:  lot’s of room to run, rabbits to chase, dirt to dig, children to play with, and so forth.

Recently some friends sent us this picture they took of her.   What category do you think she falls into (beautiful, ugly, big, etc.)?

We interrupt normal blogging…

Just in from NASA…

“Houston, we have a problem.” 

Just how does one get a stowaway tiger off the moon?  There is no one at Mission Control.

We have a Quaker Parrot named Sir Percival Blakeney (from the Scarlet Pimpernel), nicknamed Percy.

Percy is a funny bird.  He can speak simple words like hello, and he barks like a dog.  The funniest thing he does is laugh.  Many times when the family has been gathered in the living room, Hope or one of the children will laugh, then Percy will laugh, then everyone else laughs, Percy laughs again, and round and round it goes.

One day Karen and Kathy decided to introduce Percy to a pie pan filled with water, with the intent to induce him to take a bath.  Click here to view the result.

This past weekend we spotted a turtle in our yard, a rare event. 

This one had just finished laying eggs.  When done she headed for the other side of the house.

Unknown to Mrs. Turtle, our boxer, named Joy, was waiting to greet her.  

My first attempt to photograph this resulted in the dog seeing me with the camera and leaving, because she is afraid of the camera.  Can you believe it?  Click here to view.

Finally, I had to go in the house and photograph through the window so our ferocious and vigilant watch-dog would not see me with the camera and run away.  Click here to view a short video clip of Joy and turtle greeting each other.  Through the clip you will see the dog looking up to the right.  Hope was standing on the porch and had to keep telling her to “get the turtle.”

Pyro - the strawberry crab.

Hermit Crab Closeups.  Aren’t they cute?

We have lots of critters around our place.  Some of them are hermit crabs.  Matthew is our resident hermit crab expert.

Matthew with a large and small crab.

Seeing eye to eye.

A smaller crab that belongs to Annie.

Here are the hermit worlds, one for the small crabs and the other for the larger ones.

This is one of the smaller crabs, named Dee.

This is one of the larger crabs, named Goliath.

In addition to these crabs (known as purple-claw crabs) we have a strawberry crab named Pyro.

Click here for a short video.