Is your home purrfect in every way? If so, it might be a contender in the Purina Tidy Cats Pet Projects Design Challenge. The company is offering prizes, including cash and trips, for the most feline-friendly home improvement projects. Entries can be anything from climbable bookshelves to pounce-worthy play areas, as long as it's a project you completed with your kitty companion(s) in mind. Need an extra incentive to enter? It's a great opportunity to urge Purina to stop conducting feeding trials on animals in laboratories—and to encourage it to explore vegan food options. If you win, you could donate the prize money—or part of it—to a reputable animal shelter or animal rights organization and help even more cats in need.

tilwe/cc by 2.0

 
Whether you're remodeling or simply redecorating, there are lots of easy ways to make your crib more comfortable for Kitty:

• Bring joy with toys. From rolled-up balls of paper to high-tech motorized "mice" and laser pointers, toys liven up even the laziest feline.
• Scratch that itch. Cat "trees" and posts, cardboard scratching boxes, and "Turbo Scratchers" help cats stretch and condition their claws and save your furniture at the same time.
• Provide a room with a view. Windows are "cat TV"—a bird feeder placed near a window can provide hours of entertainment. If windowsills aren't wide enough, build or buy a cushioned perch. 
• Porches bring purrs. A screened-in porch is a great way for kitty to safely commune with nature. Another option is Cat Fence-In, a netting kit that attaches to the top of any fence.
• Plant a garden—of catnip. Cats will nibble it and roll in it. Other healthy snacks are wheat grass, alfalfa, and oat grass. 

Looking for more inspiration? You'll find hundreds of ideas (250, to be exact) for spicing up your cat's life in PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk's book 250 Things You Can Do to Make Your Cat Adore You.

 
Written by Michelle Sherrow

A survey by Purina shows that 60 percent of doggie guardians are including their pooches in their Valentine's Day plans. The survey also found that 26 percent of guardians say "I love you" to their dogs at least once a day—the same percentage that share the sentiment with their significant other on a daily basis. Might as well face it, we're addicted to loving our dogs.

That's why Purina hosted a celebrity-studded "Be My Valentine" Doggie Dinner Party, complete with a red carpet stroll for the canines and live entertainment (Three Dog Night, perhaps?). I wonder if anyone asked for a doggie bag?

If you missed the doggie dinner party in New York, don't worry—you can still host a dog party of your own. (There are lots of fun ideas in PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk's book Let's Have a Dog Party.) Or you could take a cue from a group of kindhearted second-graders in Virginia who delivered valentines to outdoor dogs in hopes of convincing their owners to show love to their dogs by taking them inside.

However you plan to pamper your pooch (or someone else's), here's wishing you a happy Valentine's Dog—er, Day!

Written by Michelle Sherrow