August 11, 2021
Yesterday was incredibly busy. All of the last few days in fact, now that we have decided to repurpose the spare bedroom as a temporary cat palace. It will require quite a few adjustments.
In the weekend, we went to Home Hardware to get all the components for our high shelf invention (‘the Penthouse’). This is to offer Mitsy some private space, although I think the little rascals will soon find it. It is too high for them to easily climb and once they are up there it would be hard to come down. Let’s hope that this adjustment will buy us some time so that she does not go crazy with 6 kittens around, up and under her.
Mitsy now often sleeps in a clean litter box. Not exactly sure why she does that. Is it the feeling of the pellets that reminds her of mulch? Is it less stuffy than the Nest? Is it to hide from the kittens as the equivalent of leaving them to hunt or feed elsewhere if she were still living outside? Who knows. In the beginning the kittens did not find her there, but by now they do.
So I felt the Penthouse might come just in time.

I spent most of the afternoon fixing it. Mitsy has not used the shelf yet. She has looked at it, she knows it is there, but has not checked it out yet. This is how she usually reacts to new things: it takes a couple of days and it is easy to assume that she is not interested at all. But it is her way of incorporating something new into her life. Hope the kittens do not outgrow her thinking process!


Post script:
The Penthouse was never adopted… I don’t know if it was too close to the ceiling of the crate or that she simply was not interested. No amount of treats and even a bowl of sardines could coax her up there. Some of the kittens eyed it, though, from the top of the scratching pole…