Tag Archives: cat

December 5, 2011 · 10:16 am

Warning: This entire post is about our new cat

I know a ton of people who will laugh when they see this, because we are total cat parents and probably spend way too much time talking about Wrigley.  But, I’m not quite ready to reveal all our Christmas decor, and it’s been way too long since we updated the blog, so this is a little bit of a space filler :) That being said, meet Theo!

He’s our newest family member :)  Yeah, he’s SUPER adorable and sooo tiny (under 3 lbs).  We picked him up a couple of weeks ago from the Humane Society of Indianapolis, a no-kill shelter here in town.  They have tons of cute & cuddly friends for you to bring home, too!

The adjustment has been a little difficult, mainly due to this hoss, aka Wrigley:

We thought he would love the idea of a little brother, but apparently we were mistaken.  The volunteers at the Humane Society and our vet both told us that even the nicest cat will take a while to adjust to a new cat in the house, but we were not ready for what we were about to go through.

At first there was a lot of hissing, and we had to keep them separated (in different rooms with closed doors) for the first several days.  Then, we let Wrigley roam free and kept Theo in the office, so they could see each other through the glass french doors. Eventually we would let them out together (supervised) to play.  The scariest part was that Wrigley (who weighs 4x what Theo weighs) kept attacking the kitten and biting his neck.  We finally realized that it is basically a dominance thing, and that Theo could get away any time he wanted – but still, it’s not what you want to see.

Anyways, now they seem to be doing just fine! There’s still the occasional play fight, but for the most part we can leave them out together all day without incident.  Theo loves to lounge all over us, including our face (we’re trying to make that stop…it’s gross).  Most of the time, he just wants to be near someone:

He especially loves laying in a “hammock” (the slack in a blanket covering my legs)…

And getting into places he shouldn’t (like the top of our dining room table messing with X-Mas decor):

But the cutest part is seeing the moments where the two cats actually seem like they like each other.  This was taken mid-neck bite, but right before this Wrigley was giving Theo a little bath. Theo obviously doesn’t care. Plus, it kinda looks like they’re hugging which is a.dor.a.ble :)

Annnd here’s a picture of all my boys, conveniently lounging on me:

In other news, we have our tree up and most of the house decorated.  Bryan is also almost finished with his latest build, so I’ll try to get a few new posts up this week!  Thanks for sticking around :)

xox,

katie

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August 10, 2011 · 12:34 pm

KWRCC

What? You don’t know what that title means? It obviously stands for Kitten Waste Refuse Control and Camouflage Center, aka another one of our projects. Yes, we’re nerds and can’t just call it “something to hide the litterbox.” Let’s back up…

We have a cat named Wrigley. He’s pretty cute (and I’m not even a “cat person”)

But you know what isn’t cute? A litter box. In the kitchen. I don’t even have a picture of it (who would take a picture of a litter box?), but this is basically where we had it prior to this little undertaking.

Since we never really use that room (we’re more of a “eat in front of the TV” couple…sad, yes), it wasn’t a huge deal.  We also didn’t want to keep it in the basement or another tucked-away area, for fear that we would just forget about it for days at a time and end up with a really upset cat (and smelly house). But, as we learned more about building furniture after our table project, we decided there is no reason to live with the ugly litter box when we could build something to cover it.

So the KWRCC idea was born. Bryan totally created this idea on his own, so I can’t take any credit. He thought up the plans from scratch, which was a big accomplishment considering we had only done a couple building projects at this point, and always used plans from an outside source. Yay go us!!

The basic idea was to create a cabinet with three sides and an opening for Wrigley to get in and out of the litter box, a small drawer to keep litter bags and the scoop, and a butcher block top to increase our counter space (yes, we know how to make butcher block…another post is coming). Who doesn’t love more counter space?

That’s basically all the counter space we had in our kitchen, with a majority of it being taken up by the microwave (which we rarely use). We decided that the best idea would be to move the microwave to the top of the KWRCC in order to clear up some space for everyday use.

Bryan started building using some 2x4s we had leftover from the table. Unfortunately, something just didn’t look right.  It was too bulky, and didn’t look like it would naturally be found in a kitchen. So that idea was scrapped, and the KWRCC version 1.0 has found a new home in the workshop.

Starting on version 2.0, Bryan used thinner boards, which made a huge difference.

He also learned how to use a router to create those white inset panels, which really gives it a custom look. Here’s a view of the back:

A quick couple coats of white paint (another use for the gallon of white I bought for painting the trim in the bathroom stripes project), and the attachment of the butcher block, and we had a new cabinet! (Edit: we actually built the butcher block top from 1×2 pieces of wood – sadly, I don’t have any pictures of the process, but I’m sure we’ll build another soon and will document everything for inquiring minds).

And a view from the side:

Pretty, huh?  And the best part, of course, is how HUGE our counter feels without that microwave!

Yay!

xox, katie

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