Cat parent hacks...

I love cats! I've owned a few over the years, and the chaos they can create when you don't pay attention to their needs can be overwhelming. So I'm going to share some things, that I have found you can do, to minimize the horror!

First of all; Before you get any kind of pet, please study the animal that you wish to own. Go to Youtube, find articles online, read books, find bloggers and ask questions. If a cat is what you really want, then please also watch all of the episodes of My Cat from Hell. You will learn most of what you need to know from just watching that show. General consensus? You will get out of your cat what you put into the relationship with your cat! Cats need to have cat things to do, plain and simple.

Please note that some people get really lucky, and end up with low maintenance cats. This isn't going to always be a beautiful fairy tale. Some cats are amazing alien beings that require a lot of attention, or they will destroy everything.

Secondly; You are never going to have a perfectly clean home if you decide to own a cat. They will constantly be working against you, and all that you wish to keep clean. It's just how they function as animals. This is not me saying that they're bad, or awful pets. This is just a fact. As much as we may wish it, animals are not people, and they have very different needs than people. Animals are gonna animal.

There are a lot of things you can do to maintain your home to a pretty good degree of cleanliness, however, it won't ever be for more than one day. Be prepared to vacuum constantly. You will find cat hair, and cat litter everywhere in your home. Actually, everywhere. I have found clumps of cat litter in the strangest places. Places that I would have thought, before, to be impossible. I have a handheld vacuum in both of my bathrooms, and 3 full size vacuums for other designated spaces in my 2 story home. I also have 3 indoor only cats. Yes, I am insane, and no, I do not care.

Hack #1. Keep their nails clipped if at all possible. Both of my boy cats can get their nails trimmed with very little drama, but my girl I have to wrap up like a full blown kitty purrito to do her nails. Just pull one foot at a time from the wrapped up purrito towel. I actually have not had to do this to her in a long time. She's not a huge scratcher. She's getting older and she's super mellow.

Hack #2. Get the furniture covers. Get the throw blankets. Only dare to uncover your pretty furniture during times you have guests over. Cats don't only cause drama to your furniture by scratching it, they can also sag the fluffy back cushions by laying on them regularly, and their hair will imbed into the fabric so tightly that it's nearly impossible to get it all out. Save yourself the trouble, and cover it all for daily use. Some people do the plastic covers, and I'll tell ya that as a toddler mom, I do wish I could do that with my furniture. Alas, one of my cats (The ORANGE one) is an avid fan of eating plastic, or anything close to the consistency of a plastic grocery bag. This also includes thin vinyl covers/tablecloths, as well as tape! So we must always choose fabric covers for things.

Hack #3. Have scratching posts/towers for them to use. Giving cats their own furniture to climb, scratch, and play on will drastically reduce the need to destroy your furniture, curtains, etc. My cats love having a tower, little cave-like beds, and soft throw blankets to mess up, lay in/on, and play with. I have a nice counter top that I put two of those fluffy round beds on top of in my upstairs hallway. All 3 of my cats take turns cuddling into one of those during the day.

Hack #4. Stick on scratching deterrents, or stick on scratching fabrics. I have some recliners that have that fake leather fabric around the outside and on the corners. My cats have decided they LOVE to scratch that, and I've even caught my younger cat biting it. I decided to try something that looks like stick on carpet, not only to hide what they did to the furniture, but to also give them something they CAN scratch that is replaceable when it also starts to look icky. I have to say I like how this ended up working, for us. I have also used the stick on scratch deterrent, which looks like clear stick-on laminate, and it works pretty well for things like toy bins, and ottomans. I have not personally had luck with it on my actual furniture, but it might also work if you have the right style (Very square, not many curves).

Hack #5. Stick down your carpets, if possible. One of my youngest cat's favorite things to do is attack my bathroom mats. I don't know what kind of invisible threats lie beneath my carpets, and floor mats, but this young'un sure does take his job of ridding us of them, very seriously. My bathroom can't be the only one out here that ends up looking like a tornado flew through it. No? Just me? Well I got double sided tape for sticking down my rugs, and they work for a while. It's not a perfect solution, but it does help. The need to defend us from the invisible threats underneath of those innocent looking bath mats is just too strong.

Hack #6. Let your toddlers/kids play with them! Okay, hear me out. If you are the parent of a toddler, and they're able to hold a fishing pole cat toy, let them have at it. I was worried that my brute of a toddler wouldn't be able to handle this type of play, and boy was I wrong! I decided to give it a try, one fateful day, and the first few minutes were what I had expected. My toddler whipped the fishing line and toy around so hard, and fast, that I wondered if he was just too young to 'get it'. I stayed clear of the whipping distance (mind you there's not much danger on the end of the line, just a fluffy little worm toy, but I didn't want it in my eyeball), and watched. After he noticed the cats chasing the super wild, whipping, worm...he slowed down. He still whipped it harder than it needed to be, but he liked watching the cats hunting the worm toy. Eventually he started walking backward as he watched them pursue the worm, and he fell in love with this game. He also started whipping it in different and new ways to get the cats to react, like up toward the stairs, or into some opened amazon boxes. Now if the cats are in need of some solid play time I just hand my son that fishing pole toy and they have a blast. You're also killing two birds with one stone, as it is also great exercise for your kiddo! If you do not have kids, and your cats are indoor only, laser toys, and fishing pole toys are superb for helping them to get out that need to hunt, and it's so much fun to do.

Hack #7. If you feed multiple pets - I have a dog, as well as 3 cats in my home. My dog eats from her bowl on the floor, on a nice mat. When we had only 2 cats, I purchased a silicone mat and semi flat dishes, and would feed my cats on top of our clothing dryer. Cats that eat wet food are MESSY!!! Somehow it can and will be flung everywhere. I was astonished at how messy they are when eating. Having a silicone mat, and semi flat dishes that you can wash off every few days is essential! Now that we have 3 cats, the top of the dryer was not enough space for them to eat up away from the dog. I just so happen to have a table in my kitchen that is NOT used, by any of us people, to eat on. So, I moved all 3 little dishes on to a couple of those silicone mats to that table (Pictured above), and it works out wonderfully for them. I'm glad I had the space, but I know not everyone will need to do this.

Off topic, but - Living with cats is often compared to living with a roommate who doesn't pay their share of the rent, or is a Monarch. I mentioned this before at the beginning of this post, but to me, cats are aliens. There's just so much that is so weird about them.

I will update this post if there's anything else that I find useful to add.

If anyone has any questions, or is curious which products I have used I will gladly share them with you. You can email me at autumnwhinny@gmail.com .

Thank you for reading, and God bless you.

E. G.