Welcome New Friends!

Dear New Friends from India, England, and Around the World,

Namaste and Welcome to the Little Buddhas' very own Blog written by the Little Buddhas themselves. And, while they are indeed Buddhas in the highest Spiritual sense, they are also naughty, mischievous, fun-loving little Pirates who play tricks stealing each others' food, playing chase, and flirting with CoconutPie here,
the only girl. She is the Secret Ringleader of them all, although she can really assume an expression of innocence, don't you think? Just look at her!
(Do NOT Be Fooled, she is only looking that way to fool you!)

We are a fun-loving herd full of laughter, adventure, and even a few tears now
and then. 

Welcome new friends visiting for the first time...Just Remember THIS:
Please enjoy the photographs because very little you read will make sense.
(And that's the best part!)

With Deepest Respect, Gratitude and Pranaams,

Chana and the Little Buddhas

GOT OWLS?

Christmas has come early in the Little Town of Bellingham as snowy owl sitings continue to increase! This rare arctic owl is being sited as far south as Seattle and numbers reported to the Audubon Society suggest we may, indeed, have these stunning owls migrating south in even larger numbers come January due to a bumper crop of lemmings in the Arctic! Gonna get us one, mum finally gonna get one for her "life list" and we gonna love our owl! What a MERRY Christmas Present.

Wishing you OWL A VERY, MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!

{Photo by Andy Bronson, Bellingham Herald}

"A Place in the Choir" - YouTube

"A Place in the Choir" - YouTube

^^^^^(EASY ON THE EYES, TOO!)

MANY GRACIOUS THANKS TO MARIFAN

FOR HER MUSICAL ACCOMPANIMENT

TO OUR "ST. FRANCIS" POST NEXT!

PLEASE LISTEN TO THIS AND ENJOY

ALL GOD'S CREATURES,

"ALL GOD'S CREATURES GOT A PLACE

IN THE CHOIR...SOME JUST CLAP THEIR

HANDS, OR PAWS...OR ANYTHING THEY

GOT, NOW!"

SO SING ALONG:

ALL GOD'S CREATURES GOT A PLACE IN THE CHOIR!

Celebrate With Love For All Creatures

"My sister birds, you owe much to God, and you must always and in every place give praise to him;
For he has given you freedom to wing through the sky and he has clothed you...

You neither sow nor reap and God feeds you and gives you rivers and mountains for your thirst,
and mountains and valleys for shelter,
and tall trees for your nests.

And although you neither know how to spin or weave, God dresses you and your children,
for the Creator loves you greatly and he dresses you abundantly.

Therefore...always seek to praise God."

From "The Little Flowers of St. Francis"
~ St. Francis of Assisi

{Edited by Mirabai Starr}

As we end one year and enter the next, to whatever spiritual tradition we belong, if any, let us give thanks for what we, too, have received both from God and from one another, and continue into 2012, with Compassion and Empathy in our Hearts for all creatures, great and small.

Love,
Your Forever Friends here at
Panda's Peace Sanctuary for Guinea Pigs
December 2011

Waiting For Santa To Bring Fairy...

Raj waits patiently beginning tonight because he doesn't understand the time difference between England and the Pacific Northwest and wants to make sure he doesn't miss Santa when he arrives with Fairy wrapped up all ready for Christmas with him...the rest of the herd (after much eye-rolling and making "cuckoo!" gestures) agreed to bring him food and treats for his vigil. Mum gonna pet him and keep him company cuz she knows how he feels.

Not really.

But she would wait like that for a guinea pig!

Borneo's Jingle Bell - YouTube

Borneo's Jingle Bell - YouTube

Kind of a tear-jerker but we want to remember

Borneo, who passed away only days after this

video was made of him playing with his favorite

Jingle-Bell toy...kind of like we have our mini-bale

hay-tossing contests...Borneo, we miss you...

Encore Presentation of Our Names

HAPPY, JOLLY HO-HO-HO!
Mum, take it away (no! no! no!)
We ARE (from top left across...)
MacNutPie, Calvin the small,
mum holding YumYum, TAJ MAHAL, CoconutPie,
YumYum, and, Fairy's favorite: RAJ MAHAL!
(o.k. Marifan, do we win now?!)
WE LOVE ALL OF YOU!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

 

The "Little Buddhas" of Panda's Peace Sanctuary wish each and every one of you a Wonderful Holiday Season of Peace and New Year filled with Magic, Love, Peace, Joy, and - of course - Lots of GUINEA PIGS to teach us the Gift of True Giving.

Love,
Little Buddhas: (from top left - Raj Mahal, MacNutPie, YumYum as a wee lad, Cavy-Slave mum,
Raj Mahal asleep in new CuddleTunnel, CocoNutPie learning to Trust, and, of course, Calvin the small

FAIRY TEACHES THE REAL HOLIDAY SPIRIT!

Today Fairy sent me this photograph of her...and even knowing how tidy and neat she is, she still loves me when the coronet on top of my head is so mussed up!

Since mum has now taken up ALL THE MEMORY on our laptop with photographs and can no longer download pics we have taken for Fairy (until more memory miraculously appears in the mail or outer space) I had no other choice than to snitch Fairy's photograph - adding upon it my own feelings for her...
hoping she knows (OH! We know she does!) that having her in our lives has brought every single one of us ~~MagicUnimaginable~~~Hope Eternal~~~~~~
& HappyDancingPopcorningSingingWheekingJOY!
(even mum, who used the magic shovel you lovingly sent to consume a very vegan pumpkin pie in less than two days...but you didn't see that here...)

Although it's unlikely we'll get more memory for our "Magic FairyBox Photoshoot" super-soon (although you never know) we hope you envision my shameless snitchery as part and parcel of a love poem travelling visually through Cyberspace beneath the Almost-Winter-Solstice moon
where two hearts meet as ONE! (Squeeee!)
We have sooooo many MAGICS to share with all of you from Boxes Fairy has sent us...
In time, in time...

(P.S. Fairy, you know by now our mum's not so bright, and your blog posts of late have got her writing comments like the madwoman she truly is...unfortunately, since you are on the more sophisticated Bloggy-Thingy, she writes my heart out only to go"...Uh...Durrrrr....Mmmmmm.....Hmmmmm...
Sorry Raj, can't figure out how to actually post it!")
Once WE figure it out, you SHALL see our comments and swoon: please alert your mousies to catch you then...the mousies we love and adore!

GUINEA PIG CRASHES THE SUPER BOWL

Doritos® Presents: CRASH THE SUPER BOWL
While different from our beloved Geico
"row" commercial, please watch until the
Very-Very end to decide for yourself whether
or not this little piggie reveals the orange 
snout of a GUILTY-PIG in this hilarious
SUPER BOWL COMMERCIAL 
COMPETITION!

DEAR FAIRY...

Raj is too embarrassed to openly say this is now his favorite season - not because of the holidays - but because he's in love! Me being the most naive,  smallest, and most eager to please, I have agreed to this photo-shoot as his MerryEveryThingFairy Holiday Card! Hopes ya likes it! We sparkle!
Mum's best friend works in Seattle public schools in one of the most dangerous,
at-risk neighborhoods in the whole City (and this is just a Middle School) but when she wears her Menorah Hat all lit up atop her red hair and radiant smile, all the kids high-five her and think she's too cool! (Which is our opinion, too!)
So, although mum won't be lighting candles on OUR menorah (she promised her friends and the maintenance team...no matches...after they politely expressed "concerned TERROR!") but we will be spinning, snatching, and chewing up our wooden dreidels faster than you can say "aleph." Oooh, we can hardly wait!

Hey, guess what? It finally raining for the first time this month, breaking all weather records for driest December! As we approach the Winter Solstice, it would be misleading to even say we have "days"...What we have now are a few hours near noon, maybe two, that are Less Dark than the Deep Night! Soon, we will be down to only minutes which, though not technically "daytime" will qualify as "not exactly Night-time." So, we need our Holiday lights, Christmas decorations, Chanukkah menorah, and every bright, sparkly thing we can get our paws on...For this reason, Raj & me made this special for you Fairy, because this is about as bright as it gets up here in the deep, haunting, grey Heart of a Great Pacific Northwest winter!

May we join you for tea some time? Tonight we may try to squeeze into Mouse's
Matchbox because it's cold and we have our cuddle cups but where is Fairy?

Love,
Calvin the small

Holiday Greetings to All and to All a Good Night!

love,
Calvin, the small menorah-wearing Rain-Oh!Dear

Soul of an Orca

    ORIGINAL DRAWING MADE IN SEATTLE

FIRST PAINTING CREATED FROM PRINT OF ORIGINAL DRAWING
MADE IN SEATTLE...THIS ONE IS
FOR SALE. NOT THE ORIGINAL.
THIS IS OUR STORY.


There is a buyer who wants to buy the orca painting, shown above in black. This is one version of many I will complete based on the Original (on top.) The title of the original is: "Oh, Killer Whale, please teach me to breathe underwater!" and it
was drawn at a cafe across the street from the hospital in Seattle where Edwin had his cancer surgery, which included some pretty close calls, post-op...I was helpless to do anything other than ask the orca to teach me how to continue functioning in the midst of what felt like the impossible...the drawing was a plea...I sat and drew and drew while Edwin slept or had whatever they needed to do done. The Cancer Center there had an Art Therapist, can you believe that? We discovered that drawing and making birds' nests was the way my aching soul chose to express its pain. So, I rode the orca, like the girl in the movie "Whale Rider" when it took her beneath the sea...she did not drown. Nor did I. And Edwin lived.

Here's the catch. The buyer does not want the "finished" painting, she wants to also see the original...as disorganized as I admittedly am, I can usually ferret out what I need...given time. And functional neural synapses!

The truth is, I don't want to sell it. The original would sell for a LOT more money and I currently have one dollar and one cent in my checking account. I checked today. But more coming in from art sales last month will get us through the rest of the month...the point being that - financial need aside - this is "my totem whale" and it cared for me...and does not want to be "captured or sold" as if it lived in a zoo or Sea World! It wants to swim quietly in my soul, and has therefore dived to the depths of the sea where I cannot retrieve it...for now.

Whether the buyer will want the "finished" repainted version I cannot know.

But this has been the most extraordinary spiritual experience I have ever had with a piece of art...the second most extraordinary experience also was about orca whales, baby orca whales. So, apparently, the Orcas have chosen me.
We have three non-migratory pods who live right here in the San Juan Islands.
I have never seen one, refusing to take an "orca boat tour" as I believe these boats disrupt their normal behavior, placing them at risk. That is not respectful.
So I have only seen Orcas within.

That is all I have to share.  I don't know how the buyer will respond to this,
but I am truthful about this experience and we do live amongst some pretty darn Sacred Native American land, sea, mountains, and sky: All deserve the utmost Respect. They humble me.

Love,
Chana