Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

CANDLELIGHTING

Hello readers. This is Niamh Piggyfriend reporting. Our Slave is away on holiday so our pigsitter, her son, Sean, helped with our candlelighting ceremony this year and he took these photos of yours truly.

Here you can see me with the candle that Slave left for me to light. Actually she asked Sean to help me in case I set fire to my whiskers. Slave also lit a candle in Mexico in her own time zone but we must wait for her to get home as she has no way of getting her photo off her camera until then. We will post that one later on.

We hope that you all joined in our ceremony to remember dear absent friends.

9 march Peter Gurney memorial: light your candle at 8PM (in your timezone)

For some of you it is already past 8 in the evening, but here's a reminder to light your candle at 20:00 ( in your time zone) to remember Peter Gurney and your beloved late guinea pigs or other loved ones. Ralphy wrote this on 8 March,  but be sure to light your candle on today (the 9th)!

'Ralphy Lauren, the GP, here to remind everyone that March 9th is
almost here!  In fact, in some places it might already be here!  So
get those candles ready and be sure to light a candle or candles on
March 9th, at or around 8:00 pm, in your time zone.  This is our 12th
Memorial honoring all of our friends, both 2- and 4- footed who are at
the Rainbow Bridge looking after us, to let them know that we are
honoring them on this special day (which was Peter Gurney's Birthday)
by lighting our candles.  As candles are lit in each time zone, the
light will move around the world for all to see.

This is my third PG Memorial (I am 2)! Afterwards, just send a post
with your location to the GPDD or to PG_Memorial@gpdd.org.  Either one
is fine, and we will keep a listing and post all the locations where
our candles were lit.  Also, if you could take a photo of your candle,
or of you with your candle, or with your slave, we will include that
too.  Last year my friend Audrey took a photo of me with my candle and
it was put on the GPDD webpage!  My Mama Rickie was so proud!

So be part of this great tradition and tell others to light a candle
too, but get their location!

Sincerely, Ralphy Lauren (the GP)'

A Piggy A-Z. E is for Endive

We have to confess that we, the Piggyfriends, have never been given this vegetable but it was suggested by our fellow bloggers so here is a photo of it courtesy of the Guinygirlz and Berke ( whose name should have an accent but we haven't got one on our laptop ).

Who's that little one?

We thought that it looked a bit like frisee lettuce, which we sometimes have so the Guinygirlz have tried  to describe what the difference is. They say that frisee is a lot more crunchy (like lettuce should be) and Endive leaves are bigger (about 20 cm long) getting smaller in the middle of the Endive. Frisee is frilly all over, Endive is just frilly at the end (green part) of the leaves.

We Googled Endive and some of the images shown were of chicory ( which we love ) so we were confused.

The Guinygirlz and Berke like Endive, though it can be a bit bitter, so there definitely is a link with chicory somewhere. They get their humans to rinse the sand off the leaves, the sand being mostly in between the outer leaves.

Their humans eat it too, mostly in summer, in a mash (of potatoes) with raw Endive because if you cook it it becomes really bitter. In their quest to find the difference, the Guinygirlz found on a dutch website that Frisee is just curly Endive, making us all more confused...

If any of you readers like Endive do post in our comments section and let us know. We'd love to hear from you.

Piggyfriend Valentines

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. We are sorry that we are a bit late with our post but here are our two elderly Valentines, Otto and Angelina.

Otto has given Angelina two roses and a box of grass, which they are sharing.

"I think that there might be a bit more grass in this box, Otto." says Angelina.

We hope that you all got lots of treats and that your humans were given flowers and chocolates.

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day from Apollo, Dante Wigglebottom, and Dmitri!

Silly pigture

Hi there everypig,

Our Slave brings home boxes from the supermarket for us to use as houses. Look at the label on this new one!

She says that Pignoletto is the name of a grape from which an Italian sparkling wine is made but we know better, don't we? It looks like "little pig" to us and Louis says that it is a nice roomy box for his morning nap.

A Piggy A-Z. E is for Eddie

We are now starting E in our Piggy A-Z with our friend Eddie. Here is his pigture.

And here is his story..........

Hi, I am Eddie, AKA Agent Confetti, helping represent "E." I like the letter "E" because it was the first letter of my first brother's name, Ethan (RIP), who was also known as Agent Peruke or Agent Sheep.

I hope you like my photo. In it I am being mysterious, but I am also trying to show my crest. I am a tricolor crested guinea pig and am just more than four years old. My mom and dad adopted me when I was a baby. They took Ethan to a rescue a couple of hours away, and Ethan met five piggies and chose me! We were great brothers and friends for three years.

Now I live with my brother Nugget, whose adoption day is Groundhog Day, Feb. 2. He and I met a year ago.

Recently I had bladder-stone surgery. Bladder stones are not nice and do not belong in piggies. My mom does her best with my diet, and Nugget and I drink bottled water, but she has a theory that crested piggies are prone to stones. Since the surgery, I am back to my favorite pastimes, such as watching weather radar and waving shredded newspaper (part of my bedding) to get attention for food. I believe that an agent should be aware of the world (hence my interest in the weather) and should be versatile (hence my using bedding as a semaphore).

Nugget and I share a very big cage (or house) made of C & C cubes, and in it we have lots of cozies, a "sofa," a PVC tube, and an "A-frame" that my dad made out of wood. In the spring and summer, the A-frame is one of my favorite places to be. We also use our carrier and a wooden house when we have floortime. My mom says I am smart because when we have floortime and I want to return to my house, I chase her around.

As for food, it is very important. I love hay, of course, and cucumbers are one of my favorite veggies. I also like to angle my pellet bowl at 45 degrees to make for easier access to it. This dumps some of the pellets out, and my mom has to return them to the bowl. It is important to make your humans do things for you.

I also trained my mom to transport me via the PVC tube, although she thinks she trained me to use it. Nugget now uses the tube as well. As you know, an agent has to be adept at psychology.

Thank you for reading about me. I am proud to be Agent Confetti and a proponent of "E."

Introducing Three New Piggyfriends

Hello readers! My name is Carter and I am a new Piggyfriend. I am a white and silver agouti boar.

I was dumped on someone's doorstep in a cardboard box and was taken to Palace Piggies rescue. There were lots of piggies living there all waiting for new homes amongst whom were three little sisters. They were all on pregnancy watch as they had been visited by a boar who jumped into their pen at their previous home.

Luckily they proved not to be pregnant but one of them did not get on with her sisters, so she went to live with another boar and the others came to live with me. The nice ladies who run Palace Piggies said that the girls were keen on escaping and were not used to being picked up and they raced around the pen when my new Slave came to see us. I was a good boy and she picked me up for a cuddle. Then she managed to catch the girls.

She took us all home with her and we now live in a roomy corner pen. There are lots of other piggies here, some of whom also came from Palace Piggies.

Slave liked my name but decided to change that of my friends and here is a photo of Saoirse. Her name means freedom in Gaelic, which seemed appropriate as she was trying to get away when Slave came to see us.

And here is her sister, whom Slave has renamed Aoife. I can tell them apart as Saoirse has black patches over both eyes whereas Aoife only has a patch on one side. They are Abyssinians. Slave says that most Abbies are excitable.

Some of the piggies here have told me than I can be an Undercover Agent as I am a big, grown up piggy and I think that will be very exciting. My little friends are too skittish at the moment but I expect that they will calm down when they have been here for a while.

I actually have pink eyes but my friends eyes are black and Slave apologises for her poor photography. I don't know much about this but Slave says that she will take some better photos when they will sit still.

Here is a pigture of us all having some grass. Yum, yum!

Slave says that I should tell you how to pronounce their names. Aoife sounds like Eefa and Saoirse sounds more or less like Seersha. I am just going to call them my friends. I love having friends. Life is good.

Happy Holidays from Apollo, Dmitri, and Dante Wigglebottom!

Wheeee hope everyone and everypig had a wonderful holiday! Here are some of our photos from Christmas and New Year's!

Look what the postman brought at Christmas!

This package arrived for Slave all the way from the U.S.

When she opened it, out popped this big fat plush piggy. He is a gift from her son, who used to help take care of the Piggyfriends before he moved to the U.S.

Look below and you can see that he is even bigger than Magnus!

We love his heart shaped nose.

New Agent reporting for duty...

Raani has reached agent weight, she is now 10 months old and a 1000 grammes (= 1 kilo)!

She is reporting for duty as Agent Queenie.
Why Queenie you might ask? You might remember how she got her name.
Her slaves really like Rex (and US teddy, so the (shorter) fuzzy haired) piggies, after Roos left us, they realized they no longer had a rex or US teddy pig left, so the quest for a new fuzzy began!
Rex is latin for King, but as Raani is a girl piggy we thought Queen would be more fitting. Slave Mikey started searching for translations of Queen in different languages and the word Raani means Queen in Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali and so on.... So her name literally means queen in quite some languages. It can be spelled differently in these languages.

Raani enjoying chin rubs #guineapig

A photo posted by Mieke (@pandameisje) on Nov 12, 2016 at 1:29am PST

She has lovely little paws, which make her look very regal. But don't be fooled, she can be really fast, giving her slaves a hard time when they want to catch her for a check up. Slaves considered giving her a racing name for a while, like lightning mcQueenie (after that red car from the Disney movie) or mad Max after that young Dutch formula 1 driver Max Verstappen...

The guinygirlz Tijger, agent Queenie (aka Raani), and agent brave sir Robin (aka boar Bérke)

Gingerbread Piggies

After we posted about our Gingerbread Piggies, our GPDD friend, Joanie, asked to see a photo so we thought that the best way to share would be to post it here.

Here are some of them waiting for the icing to set. In the background, you can see two lovely piggy cards that we received from Ann and Stefanie and the Surrey Squeakers. We think that the piggy on Ann's card looks like our Magnus. We must find a red nose and duplicate the photo.

Love from the Piggyfriends. xxx

Santa Pig has been!

" Wake up piggies," says Lulu Piggyfriend. " Santa Pig has been in the night and left us all these fruits and veggies."

"The plate is empty and there is only a little piece of carrot left!"

Will Santa Pig come and fill our Christmas stocking?

Otto Piggyfriend has put a Christmas stocking underneath the tree.

" I have left some carrots, candy canes and a plate of gingerpigs for Santa and his reindeer." says Otto. " We have all been good piggies so I hope that we find some presents under the tree in the morning. Go to sleep now piggies or Santa will not come!"

So why should Santa Pig be a boar?

Angelina thinks that she would make a good Mrs. Santa.

What do you think?

Here comes Santa Pig, here comes Santa Pig......tra la....

Magnus Piggyfriend doing his impersonation of Santa Pig.

Casper Piggyfriend is getting ready for Christmas

Hello everyone. All of the Piggyfriends are getting excited about the coming Holiday and Slave, of course, is busy with her camera.

This was meant to be a pigture of the Dangermice but Cosmo was, unsurprisingly, uncooperative so Slave brought on a substitute who sat nicely beside me.

I like my new friend, especially as he did not want the grapes so I ate them all. I love grapes.

Love from Casper Dangermouse.

Well, someone has to eat all those nasty sprouts

Whilst we don't agree with giving piggies lots of brassicas for fear of them getting gassy, we thought that we would share this video, which was on the BBC news. We are not sure how to embed a video as we have never done this so here is the link.....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-38339201

Slave says that lots of concerned people voiced their opinion on giving these piggies lots of sprouts so that is good but we did enjoy seeing all those lovely piggies.

We will not be given any sprouts on Christmas Day. Slave hates them and only buys a few for her son, our pigsitter, who loves them and who will be staying with us for a few days over the holiday.

Friday video: Guinygirlz feeding frenzy

 Do turn the sound on to hear them running up against the window, and to hear Erwin telling Tijger to do a spin. (notice that the first spin was done without the command, Tijger will get impatient and start spinning herself...)

Have a great wheekend!
Guinygirlz: Tijger, Raani and boar Berke