jQuery.preloadCssImages = function(){
	  var allImgs = [];//new array for all the image urls
	  var k = 0; //iterator for adding images
	  var sheets = document.styleSheets;//array of stylesheets
	  for(var i = 0; i<sheets .length; i++){//loop through each stylesheet
		  var cssPile = '';//create large string of all css rules in sheet
		  var csshref = (sheets[i].href) ? sheets[i].href : 'window.location.href';
		  var baseURLarr = csshref.split('/');//split href at / to make array
		  baseURLarr.pop();//remove file path from baseURL array
		  var baseURL = baseURLarr.join('/');//create base url for the images in this sheet (css file's dir)
		  if(baseURL!="") baseURL+='/'; //tack on a / if needed
			  if(document.styleSheets[i].cssRules){//w3
				  var thisSheetRules = document.styleSheets[i].cssRules; //w3
				  for(var j = 0; j<thisSheetRules.length; j++){
				  	cssPile+= thisSheetRules[j].cssText;
			  }
		  }
		  else {
		  	cssPile+= document.styleSheets[i].cssText;
		  }
		  //parse cssPile for image urls and load them into the DOM
		  var imgUrls = cssPile.match(/[^\(]+\.(gif|jpg|jpeg|png)/g);//reg ex to get a string of between a "(" and a ".filename"
		  if(imgUrls != null && imgUrls.length>0 && imgUrls != ''){//loop array
			  var arr = jQuery.makeArray(imgUrls);//create array from regex obj
			  jQuery(arr).each(function(){
				  allImgs[k] = new Image(); //new img obj
				  allImgs[k].src = (this[0] == '/' || this.match('http://')) ? this : baseURL + this; //set src either absolute or rel to css dir
				  k++;
			  });
		  }
	  }//loop
	  return allImgs;
  }