Mischievous
Kittens

A Kitten, a Goldfish, and Twenty-Seven Years of Trouble

The Mischievous Kittens series launched in 1999 with a premise as simple and true as any in the Hallmark catalog: a kitten, unsupervised, has found something it shouldn't have. The first entry placed the kitten at a goldfish bowl — a very playful kitten who seemed to want the goldfish as a friend, the ornament's verse noted, before the fish started to roll around. The scene is immediately recognizable to anyone who has ever owned a cat: the kitten's expression of fascinated, innocent curiosity paired with the universal cat-owner knowledge that this will not end well for the goldfish.

That premise has sustained the series for twenty-seven years. Each entry places a new kitten in a new situation of escalating holiday hazard — a stocking to be investigated, a hamster cage to be examined, a cookie tray to be raided, a succulent to be knocked over, a gym bag to be climbed into, a bird house to be investigated, a laptop to be sat upon. The scenarios grow more contemporary as the series continues: the 2025 Lap Top kitten is as of-the-moment as the 1999 goldfish bowl kitten is timeless, and both are equally true to the same essential fact about cats.

The series is the perfect gift for cat people — not because it flatters cats, but because it understands them. Every mischievous kitten in this collection is doing exactly what cats do, and anyone who lives with a cat will recognize the behavior immediately and laugh, because they have been there. The ornament is a portrait of their cat. Specifically their cat. Every December.

From Goldfish Bowls to Laptops

One of the most enjoyable things about following the Mischievous Kittens series across twenty-seven years is watching what counts as mischief in each era. The early entries tend toward classic holiday scenarios — a stocking, a milk glass, a wrapped package, something Christmas-specific. The later entries open outward into the full texture of contemporary domestic life: a hamster cage (2020), a cookie tray (2021), a succulent (2022), a gym bag (2023), a bird house (2024), a laptop (2025). The kitten has expanded its repertoire along with the century, and the mischief has become a kind of cultural record — a list of the things that cats have reliably ruined across twenty-seven December seasons.

The series title names capture this evolution beautifully. Early entries carried only a year: Mischievous Kittens 1999, Mischievous Kittens 2000. The mischief was implied — universal, whatever a kitten might do. Starting around 2015, the entries began receiving specific subtitles: Bird Feeder (2015), Stocking (2019), Hamster Cage (2020), Cookies (2021), Succulent (2022), Gym Bag (2023), Bird House (2024), Lap Top (2025). The named entries are more specific, more immediate, and funnier — because naming the object names the crime, and naming the crime makes it more recognizable to anyone who has watched their cat commit the same one.

The Cat Person's Tree

Cat people know something about cats that non-cat people sometimes miss: the mischief is the point. The knocked-over glass, the attacked ornament, the occupied laptop keyboard, the 3am sprint — these are not things that happen despite cats being beloved; they are part of what makes cats beloved. The chaos is affectionate. The Mischievous Kittens series understands this perfectly, which is why it has run for twenty-seven years on a premise that never changes: a kitten, something it shouldn't have, and the specific delight of recognition.

Every entry is a portrait of a real cat doing a real thing. The Succulent kitten (#24, 2022) is every succulent that has ever lived near a cat owner. The Hamster Cage kitten (#22, 2020) is every hamster that has ever tried to sleep while a cat watched. The Lap Top kitten (#27, 2025) is every Zoom call interrupted, every spreadsheet corrupted by 47 consecutive presses of the letter J. The series is a twenty-seven-year catalogue of the ways that cats have made themselves central to the domestic holiday experience — not as background decoration, but as active participants in the season's events.

The cat people who collect this series are collecting their own stories. Each ornament is an occasion to say: that is my cat. That is what my cat does. That is Christmas in my house.

Tips for the Collection

• 01
  The complete twenty-seven-kitten run is one of the most personality-driven collections in Hallmark. No other series is as specific to its subject's known behavior — every ornament is something a cat has actually done, in a home where cats live, in December. Displayed in sequence, the twenty-seven entries read as a documentary of cat behavior across twenty-seven holiday seasons.
• 02
  The 1999 #1 is the series' most collectible single entry. Hard to find, small production, the one that started everything — the goldfish bowl kitten is the ornament that established the premise. For collectors who want one entry, this is the one. For collectors building the complete run, securing this is the most satisfying challenge.
• 03
  The named entries (2015 onward) are the most immediately giftable. "Gym Bag" for the gym-going cat person. "Lap Top" for the work-from-home cat owner. "Cookies" for the baker whose cat helps in the kitchen. The named entries from 2015–2025 are perfectly matched gift choices for specific cat people in your life.
• 04
  The Mischievous Kittens are a natural companion to the Puppy Love series. For households with both cats and dogs — or for the cat person whose best friend is a dog person — the two series make a natural pairing on the same tree, each representing its animal's characteristic relationship with December.
• 05
  The series is still going — and the mischief keeps evolving. The 2025 Lap Top kitten is the most contemporary entry to date, and the 28th entry is still being plotted. Already Christmas carries all twenty-seven confirmed entries, from the founding goldfish bowl through the laptop, with the next disaster still to be determined.