Happy Holidays!

Wishing everyone a Happy Holiday Season!!

With much Health & Happiness in the New Year!

The Sad Effects of Global Warming on our Animals

Abandoned baby hedgehogs are too weak to hibernate
by DAVID DERBYSHIRE

These lame baby hedgehogs are casualties of the chaotic weather.

They should be asleep for the winter - but instead they are nursing their broken bones at Tiggywinkles Wildlife Hospital near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire.

The RSPCA says its rescue centres are looking after hundreds of abandoned hedgehogs born during the exceptionally mild autumn and who are too small or weak to hibernate.

A baby hedgehog worse for wear after a year of chaotic weather

The odd weather has also led to a shortage of their favourite grubs, beetles, slugs and caterpillars.

RSPCA wildlife scientist Adam Grogan said: "They need to gain weight before they can hibernate."

Weak hedgehogs like the one above have broken bones and are being nursed back to health

The hedgehog with 'global balding'

A nice, soft fluffy coat is of little use to a hedgehog.

But poor old Glen is having to make do without any prickles - apparently thanks to global warming.

Vets believe his freak appearance was caused by the stress of missing out on his winter hibernation.

He was found in Peebles in the Scottish Borders long after he should have nodded off into a deep sleep until spring. He had a few prickles but now even they have fallen out.

Alison Pearson, who runs the nearby Border Beasties hedgehog sanctuary, said: "A lot of creatures miss out on hibernation. They don't recognise it is autumn because the weather is too warm or they hibernate and wake up after a few days of mild weather.

"We believe this little fellow missed out on his hibernation altogether and the stress of still being awake and trying to fend for himself has caused him to shed his prickles."

Mrs Pearson said she cannot rehome Glen until they grow back, adding: "He needs his prickly coat to survive. He does look a sorry sight."

I received an email today from Beth at Critter Camp to let me know they rescued a sweet little hedgehog they named Nicky. Nicky was found wandering around at a pet store. Apparently, someone bought him and decided they didn't want him anymore and just left him. What is wrong with people?? Good news is, Nicky is now in Beth's care and has a loving, forever home. Beth wanted to let me know that Nicky is using some of Razzle's items we donated a few weeks ago!! :)

Beth posted the following photos of Nicky using of Razzle's hedgie-bags:


And it wouldn't be like Razzle to not have any coincidences surrounding events having to do with him! The hedgie-bag that Nicky is using in these photos is the very same hedgie-bag in the following photo of Razzle. This was the photo used to create his "birthday" cake on the day he passed away. Also, is it me, or do Nicky and Razzle look strikingly alike?


I am so happy that Nicky is safe in a loving home, and feel so good knowing he is cuddling up in a warm, soft hedgie-bag that my baby once snuggled in.

I get the feeling that Razzle is pleased too.

CRITTER CAMP!!

This weekend Steve and I ventured up to German Valley, Illinois to go to CRITTER CAMP - an exotic animal sanctuary about 2 hours away from Chicago. I wanted to donate some of Razzle's things. I know Razzle would like to know his things were helping other little critters that could use them.

We met with Beth, who I swear is a saint for rescuing all these animals that have either been abused, abandoned and/or just left on her doorstep.

All of these animals have been given a second chance and so well taken care of. Beth gave us a tour and she knows the name of every single animal. I hopefully can remember some of their names. All of them were so sweet and we had so much fun meeting them all!

Shadow the Artic fox! He was so pretty...

Flash the Fennec Fox - he was so sweet!

Look at those ears!

You can't help but say "Awww!"

Quagmire, the cute Bearded Dragon

He was very friendly!

Hello from Chi-Chi!

Guinea Pig Land!

Bunny Land!

A degu!

The ferrets were so cute!

Sugar Glider!

Petey the Parrot

Turtles!

Last but not least, this is Prickleball!!

Prickleball showing everyone who is boss!

This is only SOME of the animals that reside at Critter Camp.
Check out Critter Camp's webpage with photos of all the animals HERE.

Critter Camp is a non-profit organization doing such wonderful work helping animals and providing them with a loving, forever home. If you are in the Illinois area, it is so worth a trip to visit the animals and make a donation. If you love animals and want to support a really unique exotic sanctuary that is doing such great work, I encourage you to make a donation, no matter how small. Every bit helps. Just imagine all the work that goes into helping these animals.

Critter Camp's Video - great shots of all the animals we saw!

A Special Birthday Sign?

This afternoon, shortly after I posted the last post with the Razzle pendant, Steve picked me up early from work so we could go home and open birthday presents! As always, I was thinking of Razzle, and my birthday wish for today was "I hope he's happy."

Today was a bright sunny and warm day. Driving home, all of a sudden out of the clear blue sky, it started to rain. We looked up and saw one single dark cloud that was right over our car. There were sunny, blue skies directly ahead. Then we saw the rainbow.

It was the biggest rainbow I have ever seen - a full arch - with the bright end of the rainbow going right into Lake Michigan.
I took as many pictures as I could, and as quickly as it had started, the rain stopped and we were back in bright, clear, sunny blue skies.

Somewhere, over that rainbow, is my Razzle, and I think he was saying: Happy Birthday Mom! I'm ok and happy! And by the way, nice pendant!

Happy Birthday to Razzle's Mom

I had this beautiful pendant made for me of my sweet Razzle, taken from one of my favorite photos of him. The picture was taken earlier this summer when Razzle was "caught" frolicking on his wheel.

If you've never been on Etsy.com, you are missing out. I highly would recommend the artist that did Razzle's pendant. Her name is LaWatha and her shop is here. Gorgeous stuff. You can email her a photograph of your pet, yourself, anything you want, and she can turn it into a cool pendant or a magnet. Super cute! Also makes a sweet and thoughtful gift - even if it's for yourself!

Razzle pendant & magnets

Razzle is always with me where ever I go, but now everyone can see him. Happy Birthday to me!! I sure miss you, Snifferoo.

Little signs

I want to keep a running record of all the "signs" I have received from Razzle! I already posted about some of them, but here are some examples of little things that have happened over the past couple months:

* The day after I posted my tribute video to Razzle on YouTube, I went out to CVS at lunchtime (already weird because I usually go to Walgreens, which is right around the corner). Not looking for anything in particular, I wandered over to the makeup section and was drawn to a particular shade of lipstick. The name of the color on the lipstick: RAZZLE.

Neutrogena Lipgloss - Color: RAZZLE

*On September 18th, Steve was picking me up from an appointment and noticed a store across the street that had tons of little ceramic figurine animals on a table. From a distance, he noticed one of the figures had fallen off the display table and was in the shop window on the floor. He got closer and looked at it: the one animal that had fallen was a hedgehog.

The table of animals

The "fallen hedgie":

*One night while lying in bed, I thought I heard "Razzle noises." I told Steve, "Shh! Listen! It sounds like Razzle!" Just then, Steve's iPhone, which was sitting on the bedside table - lit up all by itself (which has never happened). Even more ironic, the wallpaper on his phone was a close up picture of Razzle. So in the total darkness, a Razzle face illuminated just as we thought we heard him making noise.

*For some unknown reason, every once in a while, Steve's hands will itch they way they only did after holding Razzle.

*After talking to Razzle one morning and telling him I miss him, I was cleaning and lifted up something on top of a high dresser and found a quill. <3

Memories of Razzle. A Tribute to my Baby.

Hedgies in the News!

Orphaned hedgehogs adopt cleaning brush as their mother

Four tiny orpahned hedgehogs are snuggling up to the bristles of a cleaning brush - because they think it's their mother.

The four inch long creatures are being hand-reared by staff at the New Forest Otter, Owl and Wildlife Park in Ashurst, Hants.

Workers say Mary, Mungo, Midge and Slappy get comfort from playing with the centre's cleaning brush and enjoy rubbing against it.

Daft as a brush: These orphaned hedgehogs snuggle up to thier adoptive brush mother

The smells on the brush, which is used to sweep a yard, remind the hedgehogs of their natural habitat while the texture reminds them of their mother.

Manager John Crooks, 41, said: "They are a bit like human babies - they need activities to keep them busy.

"Because they have very poor eyesight you have to appeal to their sense of smell and touch by giving them different scents and textures.

"They like natural scents and have enjoyed playing with our cleaning brushes, soil, leaves, flower pots and the like.

"They particularly seem to enjoy rubbing against the brush.

"It may sound odd but I imagine the bristles feel a bit like their mum."

Tiny: Two of the little hedgehogs

He added: "Three of the hedgehogs came to us because their mum was sadly crushed by a council palette truck at one of their depots.

"They are only a couple of weeks old.

"The fourth one is a little bit older and was found wandering around a back garden in the middle of the day.

"The home owner left it alone for a while to see if it would find its mum but after a few hours it was still by itself so she brought it into to us."

The hedgehogs will be fed until they are full-sized and then they will be released back into the wild.

John said: "We are feeding them milk powder mixed with kitten food - but they don't like fish flavour - they prefer nice meaty chunks.

"When they get older they will move onto proper cat food and will occasionally be given slugs and snails as a treat.

"There has been a real surge in slugs this year because of the wet weather so hopefully that will mean a good year for hedgehogs too.

"I would urge people not to kill garden slugs with pellets because the poison will be passed on to hedgehogs and a build up of poison could be fatal.

"If the weather is good they could be released in a month or so, otherwise we will feed them over the winter so they do not hibernate and then relase them in spring."

Playtime: The baby hedgehogs enjoy themselves with their 'mother'

He added: "They are quite a handful and each has their own character.

"One is quite snappy and another fairly sleepy."

More Signs from Razzle

This past weekend, Steve and I went up to Albany, Wisconsin for a little get-away. As mentioned in my earlier post, our first stop of the morning was to grab that cute hedgehog bag.

On the ride up to Wisconsin, I had my new bag in my lap and kept looking down admiring it. Steve would look over at me periodically and laugh saying, "You really like your new purchase, huh?" How could I not? The print so perfectly captures the little poses of hedgehogs that it looks as though they were drawn from photographs I have of Razzle.

The 2-1/2 hour ride up was very relaxing and we were enjoying the views of wide open spaces, horses, cows and corn.

As we were nearing our destination, I heard Steve say: "Oh. My. God." I looked out my passenger side window and saw the sign: Edelweiss Golf Course ahead.

Edelweiss!!! hee hee! :)

We got to our Bed & Breakfast too early to check in, so we decided to go exploring around. The Inn Keeper suggested a cute town that was only a few minutes away, where there were coffee and gift shops. We drove over and walked around all the cute shops, deciding which one to go in first. One in particular caught my eye, and we went inside. We didn't see the name of the store until we were already at the threshold of the doorway:

Edelweiss Bath & Body.

I had to get one of these!

Smells so good, you want to eat it!

On the way home, Steve asked if we could stop off at a store - he wanted to check out a line of lamps that his company reps. We walked around the store, up and down the aisles, looking for the lamps without any luck. Suddenly I spied a bunch of ceramic hedgehogs on one of the shelves and beelined over to it. Strange item to be in this particular store, so we just had to laugh. Steve didn't really like the look of these hedgehogs. I admit, they were no Razzle, but a hedgehog is a hedgehog!

We still were not able to find the lamps, however, and we continued to look around the store. I went back over to the hedgehogs to pick one out, trying to find the "cutest" one of the bunch, when I noticed one of the hedgehogs was facing in a different direction than the rest of the pack. I straightened them all out and then looked behind me to across the aisle: there were the lamps we were looking for! They were across the aisle from the hedgehogs....in the same direction that the one hedgehog was "looking". Steve had a new respect for the "ugly" hedgehogs.

Of course, one came home with us:

Coincidence? Was Razzle with us? I'd really like to think so. :)