Happy New Year! WOW, 2011 ... was I the only one thinking we would be flying around Jetson-style by now?
So this is the big year ... the baby is due to arrive in June, just six short months away. It seems like a lot of time, yet sometimes feels like it's tomorrow when I think of all the preparation we still need to get done.
As most of you know, we are already the proud pet-parents to three cats: Moses (10 years old), and Charlie and Coby (1 1/2 year old brothers). They currently occupy our third bedroom--the baby's future nursery--as their own room. It sounds ridiculous, we know, that we gave them a room, but the reason behind it was motivated by our own sanity.
When we moved into our house six years ago, Moses and Clara (our other cat, whom we lost a year ago), cried at our bedroom door the first several nights after we moved in. The trauma of moving was a lot for them as they adjusted to a new house, weird sounds, strange smells, etc. So to help keep them calm, we secured them in the third bedroom at night. It gave them a safe place to be while it gave us a solid night's sleep. Consequently, the room was "decorated" with a few very old recliners, food and water dishes, and liter boxes. Six years, and two more cats later, the third bedroom has become kitty central in our house. They are no longer sequestered at night, but they are very use to having their "amenities" available to them on the second floor.
Our first task is to get the cats use to having their liter boxes and food dishes elsewhere. Luckily, they have food dishes in the kitchen, so we're hoping the transition in that department will go smoothly. The liter boxes are a different story.
Anyone with cats knows that moving liter boxes can be a tricky endeavor. Cats are very ritual in their behavior. They dislike change. We've placed one liter box downstairs already, hopefully to be followed in future weeks by the second, then the third, and finally the fourth. (If you are wondering why we have four liter boxes for three cats, the rule of thumb in cat care is one liter box per cat in a house, plus one. It cuts down on territorial behavior.)
Once we can make this transition, we can begin to think about what we want the nursery to look like. But our first challenge is cat relocation. I don't anticipate this going smoothly.
