DaisyMae Maus and the Feline Americans "Food Lady" nominee

We are nominating Mom for the Food Lady of the Yeer Award.

Our names are DaisyMae Maus, Fudge Ripple, Cocoa Puff, Sparky Fuzzypants, Pumpkin, and Lucky Charmz.

Mom let us enter this contest because Skeezix has offered to make donations to cats/people in need and we really want to help those cats/people who need help at this rough time in their lives.

The most exceptional thing that Mom has done for us this year happened back in July when she FINALLY allowed us to set up our blog. We had been wanting a blog and Catster profiles FOREVER, but Mom was wary of the whole "My Space" biz ... She'd heard creepy things about it from her high school students, so she didn't want us flaunting our cute, innocent selves about what she thought was a very unsavory aspect of the internet. But, thanks to EXCELLENT blogs by celebrities Kukka-Maria and Skeezix the Cat (and Mao & Rocky), Mom let us take a risk ... For trusting us in the blogosphere, Mom deserves our praise.

DaisyMae Maus writing ... As you learned in my "Tail of Devotion," I'm not my mom's only cat (nor am I her first cat), but I am her favorite (or so she's told me). I am very happy to live with Mom (and the Feline Americans) in a warm, comfortable house where Mom attends to our every need. There is a toy box full of cat toys, an incline scratching post with fresh catnip spread upon it, a six-foot cat "tree" in the dining room by the front window, and one in the room with my computer. Mom sees to it that we are under the care of her old friend Dr. Jaqui (our V-E-T) and that we are free of pests like ... ugh ... fleas. We are allowed free-reign of the house, but aren't allowed to go outside unless we're safely ensconced in one of our three portable prison-boxes. She wants us to be safe! We get to sleep where we want which often means on the bed with Mom. She has a full-sized bed, so she often wakes with a kink in her back because we somehow quintuple our size when on her bed. All pain aside, we're very cozy and we wouldn't have it any other way.

We don't call our mom "Food Lady," but she does make sure that we're well fed each and every day. When we get our nightly can, Mom carefully divides it into six Corelle mini-bowls so that we share equally ... and she puts our bowls where we prefer to eat. She even follows Pumpkin into the bedroom where he prefers to eat in private.

Since our household includes a "geezer cat" who is scrawny, Mom makes extra sure that he (and by extention, we) are attended to. Mom keeps the pantry full of our favorite cans (Sheba and Natural Balance), kibbles (Eukanuba, NutroMax Cat, and Royal Canin Baby Cat formula), and treats (Temptations and Dentabites). She never lets us run out and will make a special trip to the Petco or Petsmart if our food stash starts to dwindle.

Additionally, Mom cares so much about us that when she's tired and just can't cook, she picks up things that we like to eat as her dinner. She gets KFC chicken breasts, Fudgie's favorite Chinese food (BBQ'd pork), and carne asada from the taco shop just so that we can share. Sometimes we eat what she's havin' (usually MOST of what she's havin'), but sometimes we only want a sniff. Mom calls her dinner "F3" which stands for "Fudgie-Friendly Food," because she wants to keep his strength up as he continues to age and she won't favor one of us over the others when it comes to sharin'. In fact, when she's sitting at the dinner table working on a craft or grading papers and Fudgie comes up and squawks at her, she'll get up and feed him (and us) a treat ... She doesn't think anything of it ... He "asks" and she responds.

That's why my mom deserves recognition as a contender for "Food Lady of the Year" ... She's very good to us and treats us like "family."
DaisyMae Maus and the Feline Americans

Link to my blog http://daisymaemaus.blogspot.com/