Guinea Pigs - Piggy Pillows and Pads

What posh guinea pig home would be complete with out matching guinea pig pillows and fleece pads to lounge around on? None! That's Ben and Eddy's humble guinea-pig-opinion since they now have a completely decorated domicile. I started out with a traffic sign fleece cage liner and moved on to traffic sign fleece pillows and pads. They are two very lucky pigs.

Supplies:

• Fleece (large scraps will work)
• Stuffing
• Uhaul pads, towels, cotton mattress pads or other absorbent material.

Cut the fleece and padding out in the shape you want. You will need two layers of fleece per shape and one layer of padding. I cut mine so they were just a little bit bigger than the bases of the pigloos.

If you want to add any appliques now is the time. Use a wide zig-zag stitch to secure the applique to the front side of the fleece.

Layer the fleece right sides together and the padding on the wrong side of one of the fleeces. Using a half inch seem allowance stitch around the edge leaving a gap open for turning.

Clip the corners then turn right side out making sure that the fleece layers are both on the outside. The absorbent padding should be on the inside.

Pin the opening closed and top stitch as close to the edge as you can all the way around to give it a nice finished look.

If you are going to turn your pad into a pillow, after it is turned right side out stuff it and then pin the opening closed and top stitch around.

That is that! Now enjoy your matching piggy environment!

Look at that matching awesomness!

Benny Boy just snuggling up to that traffic light pillow!

Guinea Pigs

I have guinea pigs. They are cute and squeaky and fun. They are great pets for my little J and K as long as I am supervising them closely. Currently there are two of these small rodents in our family: Eddy Pig and Benny Pig.

I bought Eddy Pig a few months ago at a local pet shop. He was underweight, beat up, and had a nasty abscess under his chin. He was abandoned at the pet store by owners who no longer wanted him and my guess is took very poor care of him. The pet store was going to feed him to a snake because of his health issues! Needless to say, being an animal lover, especially of small animals, I said I would buy him. Sick or not Eddy pig came home with me. Eddy showed signs that he was not feeling well when I first brought him home but after a day of good timothy hay based pellets and some greens he was a lot more spry. It took another month to heal his abscess all the way and a month more before he started to come out of his shell. K was in love with Eddy from day one and the two spent quite a bit of time together watching Iron Man and eating carrots over the summer. Then K went back to pre-school and Eddy Pig seemed lonely.

Enter Benny Pig. Ben was a lonely little guy too from a home that no longer wanted to keep him. His previous owners put him up on Craig's List where I found him. Ben is about 2 years old and at first appeared health to me. After having him for awhile I started to notice that his feet seems swollen and odd. Ben had developed bumble foot from living on soiled litter in his previous life and I'm afraid other more permanent damage to his little feet. I have had Ben now for about 3 weeks and his feet have been improving more and more each day but he still has a ways to go.

The guinea pigs are very happy now living with us. They have a huge C&C cage (more on that development later), get half a cup each of green-good-for-them-veggies every day, all the hay they can eat, and Oxbow timothy pellet guinea pig food. These little guys have been a delight to have around. So much fun for me and the boys.