Sunday, June 18, 2017

For the love of a cat (who doubles as Houdini)

Miss Maggie
Since arriving at our new home in Whitefish, we have had a child gate installed on the stairs to keep the cats from going into the carpeted areas of the house.  (For those of you who have been reading this blog since its inception, you will know that we have two cats – Maggie, a 16-year old veteran who lords it over Josie, 2 years her junior.  Maggie persists with her dominance despite her advanced age and an obvious hitch in one of her hips.)  The gate is partly for our benefit (avoids the necessity to clean cat puke and other secretions from the carpet) and partly for Maggie’s benefit – we don’t think it’s good for her hips to use the stairs, and she is already at a low weight. 

Miss Josie





Despite the gate, we have discovered Josie upstairs numerous times.  It was a question for the ages.  Was she jumping the gate?  Squeezing through it?  Bumping the gate until the spring released? 

While puzzling over this, it occurred to us that maybe she was feeling restricted and bored.  (It should be noted that we were also finding litter on the black kitchen countertops each morning – she was clearly jumping up on them at night to get to higher ground.)  So, we decided young Josie needed a cat tree.  With time on our hands and the budget of the retired on our minds, we determined that we would build our own cat tree rather than resort to PetSmart.


The Web yielded a few reasonable ideas (for those with no fingers and all thumbs). 


We looked for a used step ladder at the ReStore, but no luck there had us in Lowe’s to buy our raw goods (and Spousal Unit gets all the credit for the measurements, etc. to make sure the thing would actually go together!)  Below are several pictures of the tree in progress.
In the garage

Ladder complete
Fabric added to platform

Platforms attached to ladder

Finished!
And I am pleased to say that Josie is using the tree – see below.


Linking to Mosaic Monday

12 comments:

  1. Ha-ha! That's great! Jingles is always looking to go higher and when she can't, she looks for places to hide. No matter what I do, she finds her way into one of my cupboards to sleep the day away. Fabulous job on the cat tree.

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    1. I do think we need to add a 'hidey-hole' of some type on one of the platforms - cats do really like somewhere small they can crawl into!

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  2. Well she had you hoodwinked for a while but you sorted things out to the benefit of you all - that's a win-win in my book. I loved the remark about 'Maggie persisting with her dominance despite her age', I so related to that!

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    1. We rescued the cats from the shelter many years ago, and they already had their names. I do think both names suit their personalities!

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  3. Clever - clever to find out that she was using the window sill - and clever to build her a tree house.

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    1. Our son tells us she has gotten through the gate again while we have been gone ... hmmm. May need more intervention!

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  4. I love your cats! We have two also. Sam who is 17 and wandered into our lives one winter. And Bessie was our neighbor's cat until she liked us better...lol She is 5. Great idea about the ladder! :) Kit

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    1. We have a couple of cats who hang in our back yard - they appear to be hunting birds ... Spousal Unit says no more pets!

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  5. Your cat is so sweet. It is funny to see him and I am smiling to him!
    The last three photos, he looks like he knows his place,(#^.^#)!

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    1. Josie definitely owns the tree - Maggie has not attempted to climb on it.

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  6. Angie, The cat tree looks spacious and comfortable. Good idea! Thanks for sharing photos of the cats and the project. Have a great week. Sylvia D.

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    1. Thanks for visiting my blog again! Wishing you a fun-filled week!

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