w1613s

There was a cat who seemed to consider my sewing room a huge bowl of cat spaghetti. She was particularly fond of the odds and ends our kids would leave in there; uninflated balloons was the top of that list. I could keep track of cat-fascination places in my sewing room. The kids were sometimes too fast for me.

One day the youngest arrived in the kitchen announcing Nefer had eaten a balloon. Immediately to the vet and after he applied the veteranarian's medical equivalent of a finger tickling the back of her throat, Nefer gave up her prize. After that she confined herself to things she could "return, one way or another" without assistance.

The vet explained to me and the child audience I brought with Nefer and me why Nefer could wind up dead because of an escapade like this one. It made an impression. He also explained and showed them the hooks on her tongue that caught things in her mouth and dragged them back into her throat and thence into her innards; winding up by telling them that once something was on those hooks there was nothing she could do to spit something out even if she wanted to.

Nefer lived to be 19. The kids are in their early 30s and almost 40s and my hair is not appreciably a great deal grayer.

Pat

Z Any Mouse

Hahaha! I have to be careful, otherwise my dog will take off with my tailor's ham.

RugosaB

I just give my dogs a roll of toilet paper. Within an hour, the floor is covered with what looks like snow.
Of course there are many times someone leaves the downstairs bathroom door open, someone grabs the end of the toilet paper, and runs!
In the basenji world, toilet paper is known as 'filler food.'

I buy their blankets at Walmart and have to check them to be sure they are the 'felted' kind. The ones with strings (threads) would be a disaster.

sparkys_mom

That must be a pretty large dog. My dog loves his toys (real dog toys) but I'm careful to keep my pincushions out of reach as they are about the same size as a toy and I don't want him to make a mistake.

mike'sgirl

I'm pretty sure she was being sarcastic. I too have a chewed up spool or two from puppies. Thankfully they didn't suffer any harm.

Sewnoma

I know you're joking, but EMPTY spools actually do make great cat toys! One of my boys gets so excited; if I hold one up and sort of swing it back and forth he goes into hunter mode and hunches down and starts twitching his whiskers and making those little hunter noises cats make. Then I roll it across the hardwood floor and he goes nuts trying to "kill" it.

I have had to pull thread out of his mouth, though, and it was down his throat too. Really unpleasant for both of us. Now I have a gate up; none of the furkids are allowed in my sewing room anymore. I've had to have things removed from a dog's intestine before, would rather not go through that fear and drama (and bills) again! Fortunately my dogs don't seem to have any interest in thread, and they know fabric is off limits unless a knot is tied into it. I do make raggy toys for them pretty frequently but I watch it and take it away if they start actually eating the thing.

Caswews

Oh I know what u mean feffertim..my foster cat loves thread , yarn, scraps of material. My dog wants nothing to do with it all. Lol silly animals.

Jingle

I gave up and just bought strong, good baby gates to keep puppy and dog out of rooms they don't need into.
I call our home the gated house or house of gates. They also keep the cats out of my sewing room. Caught my puppy 11 months old trying to chew a straight pin, by luck it was crosswise of his mouth. I took it out and now he is only allowed in sewing room when I hold him. He is low to the floor and can see better than I can.

tesspug

My dog will only play with something if it squeaks so we're safe with her. But my mother had a cockatiel whose greatest joy in life was sitting on her sewing machine and balling up the thread with her beak. You'd go in to sew and find little wet balls all over. I'm sure it was dangerous for the bird, but we didn't know that back then.

NJ Quilter

Fortunately none of our dogs have had a desire for any sewing items...and they are in the sewing room any time I am. We did have one lab that loved paper - including dollar bills (regardless of denomination). If you caught him quickly enough we had a giant brown cash machine. If not, those bills were history. Or, before the days of coin counting machines at the banks, I'd have rolls of coins sitting on the coffee table. If I left the house with them still on the table, same dog would eat the wrappers. You would come home to find puddles of coins all over the house!