Sweet Potato

Happy Halloween!  I hope you all are having fun and staying safe!

For Haleth's final Hamster Halloween Costume, I knew I wanted to dress her up as a sweet potato.  I'd like to start by saying that I hope that no one takes any offense as that is not at all my intention with this.  So the explanation is that I have nicknames or sayings for all my pets, and from the beginning, I've always called Haleth my cute little potato.  I also generally refer to my hamsters as hams.  So from there it didn't take long until I began calling Haleth my yam.  So this final costume is to honor my favorite sweet potato aka yam.

It's been such a joy doing Hamster Halloween Costumes again this year.  I hope you all have enjoyed following along with my silly creations.  While I am sure I won't get another chance to do this with Haleth as she is already fairly old, I am quite confident that Glorfindel will be able to continue this tradition as he already begs for attention and I think he will be a fabulous model.  💗

Meeple

Today has been a busy day, so I'm just now getting to posting day 5 of my Hamster Halloween Costumes series.  The idea of doing a meeple came from last weekend when Joe and I were out for lunch after church.  I told him my plans and how I was running out of time to actually do the project.  At that point, I had too many ideas and needed to make decisions on which ideas to use for this year and due to the time constraints, I specifically needed easy ideas.  As we talked and finalized the list, this just popped in my head, and I knew it was perfect!  Joe and I love board games and have over 150 on shelves that line a wall in our basement, so I'm actually surprised that this idea hadn't come to me sooner.  Of course, an idea for a costume has to include the set or background for the costume to make sense.  With so many games, I had to figure out which one to use.  Obviously my choice had to include actual meeples which did narrow down the list of possible games I could use to about 10.  My first idea was Stone Age and that's the one I went with.  Stone Age was one of the first board games we got when we first started building our collection.  I really love it, and we still play it fairly often even though we have so many newer games.

I know I put way more effort into setting up this game than necessary, but I wanted it to look like it could be a real, in-progress game of Stone Age.  As I carefully arranged pieces, Arien kept batting them around so I eventually had to lock her up.  And then I brought out Haleth, got her costume on, and set her in the middle of the board. I think she must have been a bit confused as to what she was supposed to be.  Instead of staying in one spot as a meeple for this worker placement game, she acted like King Kong trying to destroy everything in her path.  In the end, I was just pleased that Haleth didn't eat any of the game pieces.  😂

Among Us

I have mentioned this before, but pretty much every Saturday we get together with a group of friends for all sorts of shenanigans.  Last week one of the guys was sick and stayed home, so we decided we would play Among Us with him.  It had been quite a while since we had played, and we had to wait for updates which included new roles.  We weren't sure if we'd like them but decided to give them a try and found they made the game even better!  I don't know how many times we played, but I am pretty sure I was the impostor for at least half the games.  I definitely prefer being a Crewmate, but I've gotten SO much better at lying for games with friends and actually won some games as the Impostor.  😎

I will admit that this costume was not at all on my list of ideas.  But after we played Among Us again last weekend, I knew I wanted to include it this year!  I initially thought I would make it look exactly like my character with all the accessories I have, but I kinda ran out of time for the extras.  😁  In case you are dying to know what my character looks like, I typically stick with a chef's hat and a hamster in a ball that follows me around.  But for the record, hamster balls are actually dangerous for hamsters, so I'm not advocating for the use of them.

I don't think Haleth would make a very good Crewmate as she clearly is more interested in eating than in doing tasks.  And I like to believe that the last picture of Haleth is her impression of what she would look like if the Impostor killed her.  Hahaha!

Tinkerbell

 For day 3 of Hamster Halloween Costumes, I eventually landed on Tinkerbell.  This idea itself was one I had written down for a while now, but there were 2 or 3 other ideas that were much higher on the list of possibilities for this year.  But yesterday, when it came time to make the final costume, I wanted something that I perceived to be the easiest to make and fastest to complete.  I figured a plain green cape for the dress and a pair of wings would be perfect.  The fabric I used for the wings was actually quite difficult to work with and since I was rushing, they didn't turn out quite as nice as I had hoped.  But I really do love the final outcome!

Haleth had a bit of trouble fitting the whole piece of apple in her cheek, but eventually she got it all in.  😅  I did manage to catch her tongue out in two pictures.  I think that was just her getting into character as a little fairy that spends her time surrounded by children who don't want to grow up.  Haleth did a wonderful job yesterday modeling these last two costumes that I hadn't photographed yet.  I knew she had it in her, but she was just so rotten with the first group we did that I was second guessing my decision to be doing costumes with her.  I actually think she's noticed that she has a cute boy (aka Glorfindel) living next to her and that's why even though she's getting old now, she's been acting a bit crazy at times.  Hahaha!

I do wish that hamsters could stay young forever instead of growing up so fast.  😕  As a quick update, Fili hasn't been waking up as much during the day, but I still typically see him at least once.  I realized yesterday that he already has Tarcil's record beat for being my oldest ham.  I've been referring to Fili as my immortal ham, which I know isn't true, but for now it kinda seems like it could be.  Haha!

String of Pearls

For Haleth's second Halloween costume, I knew I wanted to do a houseplant.  In the past year and a half, I have really gotten into houseplants.  My collection has grown, I've learned so much, and I even joined an awesome local Facebook group where I have bought from and sold to.  I'm a sucker for syngoniums, pothos, and calatheas.  Although I managed to get spider mites in my terrarium where I keep my calatheas, and it's still unclear if I'm gonna win this battle or not.  😓  Pro tip: make sure to actually quarantine new plants for at least 2 weeks.  😐  Anyways, my three favorite plants that I own are my albo syngonium, manjula pothos, and white fusion calathea.  I definitely prefer the leafy plants that want lots of water and typically don't do very well with succulents and cacti, but I'm kinda getting the hang of those too.

When I was trying to pick what houseplant to use as inspiration for Haleth's costume, I immediately thought of string of pearls.  I have a tiny one from my sister that started out as just 4 little pearls and has grown a lot.  You can kinda see it in the background, directly behind Haleth.  I mentioned yesterday that Haleth was a bit rotten for me during pictures, but I didn't elaborate.  Well, I initially had the string of pearls in the front to be more prominent in the picture, but the little stinker tried to eat them, and I quickly found myself trying to get a hamster to spit something out of its mouth as one does with dogs or cats.  Surprisingly, I was able to get Haleth to drop the pearls and only one got a little damaged.  😅😂

Spider

 I decided that I wanted to bring back the Hamster Halloween Costumes this year with Haleth!  This is something I started back in 2014 with my internet famous hamster, Tarcil.  I did 3 Halloweens with Tarcil before he passed away.  By the way, I have ebooks of his costume days which you can find more info on by going to https://talesoftarcil.blogspot.com/p/tarcil-books.html.  Then in 2019, I picked it up again with Laurelin and did 2 Halloweens with her.  I figured that since Haleth is getting older and has been so good at modeling for me, she would be a good candidate for resurrecting this tradition.  Spoiler alert: She was actually a bit rotten, but we made it work.  😁

I started brainstorming ideas in September and then promptly forgot about it for like a month, so I knew I needed to keep it simple and that I couldn't do a dozen of them like I have in previous years.  I decided my goal would be to do 5, but my current plan is to do 6.  I still have 2 left to photograph, and one of those costumes hasn't actually been made yet... so we'll see.  😂

I'm starting this year up with Haleth as a spider.  I am pretty okay with the little ones, but definitely not a fan of big ones.  I opted to not do a single ounce of research to make her look like any specific kind of spider, so here is my take on a generic spider.  😅  Honestly, despite the fact that she just wanted to run around the floor instead of posing for pictures, I think she looks super cute and I'm happy with how her first costume turned out.  I'll be posting the rest each day leading up until Halloween!  As always, I'm curious what your guesses are for what costumes I did this year or if you have any ideas for ones to do in the future.  As a quick side note, I'm really hoping Glorfindel will be able to take this on to continue the tradition.  I haven't photographed him yet with my camera so I don't know how he'll do.  He was still awake this morning when I got up so I got him out, and he hung out on the kitchen counter while I made my coffee.  He's definitely a bit scared of this big new world he has been plopped into, but he seems to like being with me, so I'm hoping he'll be my cuddle buddy soon.  💓

Meet Glorfindel!

This little puff ball is Glorfindel!  A few weeks ago, I saw that The Pipsqueakery was getting in a ton of Syrian Hamsters from a pet store that quickly got in over their heads through their negligence which allowed for the hamsters to breed over and over again while at the store.  Anyways, I immediately applied to adopt one and a week later was approved.  It took a couple weeks to make arrangements for me to travel to Bloomington to pick out a hamster, but a couple weeks ago I made the trip.  I had hoped I could finally get a little grey one (in March of 2020 I almost had arrangements made to get a little grey one from them, but then there was a travel ban due to the pandemic, and that's when I instead adopted Fili and Kili from the Fort Wayne ACC).  There weren't any grey ones presented to me, but there was a bin of these identical looking golden, long-haired baby boys.  Admittedly I was a bit overwhelmed because I couldn't see any differences between them as they all ran around.  But as I sat with them and chatted with the awesome adoption coordinator, Amy, I began to notice subtle differences among the boys.  For example, there was one who had a comically tiny face for his body and another who the colors seemed more muted than his brothers.  After a while, a few of the hams started to dig in the bedding and go to sleep while some others began to tussle and play with each other.  That's when I noticed one by the food bowl that wasn't eating, but just standing there staring at me with his hand perched on the bowl.  

I reached down to pet him and he just squished down a bit, but stayed put and didn't run off.  I knew that's the one I wanted.  The first couple times I picked him up, he managed to fly out of my hands.  But the third time, I got him safely into my travel carrier.  I gave him some juicy veggies and fruit for the ride home, but he wasn't interested in the treats and quickly moved to the tissue box for a nap.

The drive home was longer than getting there due to more construction, but we eventually made it, and as far as I could tell, he slept the whole way.  When I first tried to remove him from the carrier, it was clear that the ride had been a wee bit overwhelming for the poor little guy as he just lay frozen in the tissue box.  I eventually got him to go into his new home, which is a 40 gallon aquarium.  He quickly ended up in his new sand bath which he seemed to instantly fall in love with.  But after a couple of minutes of digging and rolling around in the sand, he promptly plopped down and froze as if he was remembering that terrifying ride to this big, new home.  Eventually he snapped out of his daze and began to explore his new home while pausing at times to observe those watching him (which was me and the cats).

When I had asked Amy how old he was, she said 1-2 months, so I'm gonna assume he was 6 weeks old and use that to track his age.  What makes Glorfindel especially interesting is that he (along with his brothers, dad, uncles, etc.) were all neutered at The Pipsqueakery.  I believe they were also in the process of spaying the females, but so many of the females came to them with babies or were already pregnant from living together at the pet store.  Anyways, fixing hamsters is incredibly uncommon still, but I believe and hope that the work the Pipsqueakery is doing will be instrumental in being a catalyst for this becoming more popular.  There are a lot of interesting implications to be explored with this practice.  For now, my curiosity is mostly in seeing if fixing hamsters will increase the average lifespan as it is already known to do so for your typical pets like cats and dogs.  I've always felt honored when my hamsters make it to 2 years old as that is considered quite old, but maybe a fixed hamster would be more likely to live to be 3 years old.  Time will tell!

The name Glorfindel is of course from Tolkien's writings.  My husband suggested a cute, non-Tolkien name for this little guy, but I just couldn't break our tradition.  Also as a side note, I'd love if Glorfindel would make an appearance in Amazon's Rings of Power!  We'll have to wait and see on that too. Anyways, welcome to the family, Glorfindel!

If you want to adopt a fluffy little guy like Glorfindel from The Pipsqueakery or would like to donate to help the Pipsqueakery continue their work as a rescue and sanctuary for animals in need, be sure to check out their website by going to: https://www.thepipsqueakery.org/

 

Happy Hams

These are more of the pictures I took back in August.  I wasn't sure I would still post them, but I actually don't have any newer pictures of the hamsters, so I figured I may as well get these out there.  Fili is amazingly still alive and well!  He's now 2 years and 8 months old which is pretty much ancient at this point.  He's a wobbly old ham, but he sure does love running on his wheel, and often wakes up multiple times even during the day to go for a run.  This does mean he distracts me quite a lot when I'm trying to work.  Hahaha!

For the last month or so, I really wanted to upgrade my hamster enclosures for hopefully the last time.  I wanted something bigger than the 130L Samla bins I had, something that would be both hamster proof and cat proof, and I wanted two enclosures so I could always have two hamsters.  (Let's be real, I'm never gonna get back under that 3 pet limit Joe tried to enforce.  Hahahaha!)  I looked at so many options, sketched out numerous designs, and spent hours pricing materials.  The biggest factor was always figuring out a layout in our office that could work to accommodate 2 bigger hamster enclosures with all the other stuff that needed to stay to keep the office functional as my work place.  In the end, Joe figured out a layout for the office that is perfect, and I decided to go with a couple 40 gallon aquariums from Petco which I got for 50% off during their sale.  We have had the new aquariums and setup for a couple of weeks now, and I LOVE the way our office looks now!  It feels so much more spacious and classy.  I also LOVE being able to see (and photograph!) the hamsters through the glass instead of the semi-translucent plastic.  It allows me to see into their personal lives a bit better which is so cool!

I did decide that with Fili's age and the fact that he is a dwarf hamster, he truly did not need more space and would be much more comfortable living out the rest of his days in his bin instead of being moved into one of the new aquariums.  So for now we do have his bin just chilling on the floor.  I also already have a new occupant in the other aquarium.  😁  I hope to do a proper introduction next week!  👀

Haleth was very quickly promoted from a bin to an aquarium.  Female Syrian hamsters are notorious for never being pleased no matter how gigantic their enclosure is.  So I knew she'd gladly accept more space, even though she is also getting quite old.  She definitely LOVES her new home!  She is still quite shy, but I don't think she feels too exposed behind the glass as she now has even more places to hide if she gets spooked.  She also hasn't gotten sassy with me when cleaning her aquarium the way she sometimes would when I'd clean her bin, so I call that a win.  I love my little sweet potato and am glad she can live in such luxury.  Hahahaha!